The House of Plenty
by Litsztomania
Summary: It's Alec's 21st birthday and he has a decision to make - live his natural life and die with his family, or live forever with Magnus? Alec/Chairman Meow, Magnus/the word 'and' on page 243 of City of Glass. Seven-Shot.
1. The House of Plenty

_This is my take on Alec and Magnus's future. If you're not a fan of depressing Alec-dies-and-then-Magnus-jumps-in-front-of-a-bus fics, then boy have you found your story!_

* * *

**The House of Plenty**

_You can't reap the rewards if you don't take the risk._

In times of great conflict, Alec always looked to the facts for guidance. Facts were real, solid, and certain. They pointed the way to what was right and what was wrong. It seemed to Alec that all of his problems in life had resulted from him straying from the facts and following his heart. This was definitely one of those times where he needed to be level headed, to think clearly. This was one of those times where he needed to look at the facts and stuff his stupid, confusing emotions back in the closet where they used to stay.

"This is your decision, Alec. Don't let me choose. And please don't rush it."

Alec nodded absently. He didn't plan on letting Magnus influence his choice - that was why he wasn't meeting the warlock's glimmering cat eyes. All he could hear was Magnus's breathing and his own. It seemed as though all of the noise from The House of Plenty had been shut out. What had the warlock outside said? These walls were lined with the bones of the willing? It was something unpleasant and familiar like that. Alec bit his lip, staring at the luminescent blue liquid in the bowl before him.

He was thinking, remembering, seeing himself six weeks earlier. The liquid responded, showing him his own face as Magnus told him about The House of Plenty and a choice he would have to make.

_O-O-O_

_It feels like being splintered on the inside. All of your bones turn against you and bristle against your organs. Every breath aches, every heartbeat pushes you one stumbling step closer to death. Time slows and you're left there, laying on a flat infirmary bed, your eyes too swollen to open. I find myself in this bed so often that it should have my name stitched into the sheets. And hovering above me, like some sort of strange angel in leather pants, is Magnus. Though I can't see him I know he's there. I know because the shattering and splintering is going away. Magnus makes everything better. He makes me sleep even though I don't want to._

_What if he's gone when I wake up?_

_But he isn't. I sit up and he's in his usual spot on the bed next to mine, gray circles around his eyes, using a stuffed blow-fish as a pillow. I remember when Izzy bought that stupid thing when she was seven. It's too large to resemble an actual blow-fish, but it must be more comfortable than the flat hospital pillows. Feeling a little guilty, I tap him with my toes, and then with the whole bottom of my bruised foot. He growls like an irritated bear cub, but eventually opens his eyes._

_"How are you feeling?" he askes._

_"Not dead." I smile, but it's not a funny joke. Jokes aren't really my strong suit. Sometimes I say things that make him laugh, though, and that makes me happy. "I'm good."_

_Magnus sits up on his elbows, looking dented and strained. "Alec, I... I have something to ask you. But I can't figure out how."_

_My stomach dips. This is how I felt when Hodge called me off to yell at me years ago; I don't know what I've done wrong, but I know that I'm going to pay dearly for it. "Just say it," I murmur, trying not to appear worried._

_He reaches out and takes my hand. "Alec... I don't want you to die."_

_O-O-O_

Alec closed his eyes and the memory shut off. The temptation to grab Magnus's hand was almost too much, but he managed to resist. This decision was his. Alec's. The whole world didn't revolve around Magnus Bane.

There was his family to think of. Could he really go through this without them? Did he want to go through this at all? Eternity was eternity. What if he couldn't handle it? Alec wasn't Magnus. He wasn't meant to live forever. What if it drove him insane? How could he sit by and watch his family grow old and die while he stayed twenty-one forever?

But how could he grow old without Magnus?

It was all too much. It hurt to think about, so he simply put it out of his mind. So what if he was going to get old one day? That wasn't going to happen for a long time. He still had _decades _left with Magnus. That meant a lot to Alec. But at the same time, a couple of decades was nothing to an eight hundred year old. And those decades wouldn't be youthful. He would get older, weaker. Someday people would look at him like he was some sort of monster just for loving Magnus. Just because he appeared old.

Alec closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Emotions were no good. They had to go. They had to leave the equation. This was his choice and his choice was going to be made by looking at the facts. If he did this, he would have to watch his family die, but they were going to die anyways. That was nature. That was right. And if Alec went through with this, he would be denying nature.

Really, though, what did Alec care about nature? He'd defended humanity long enough - it should throw him a bone. Besides, he could die tomorrow. He could be slaughtered by a demon or hit by a train or choke on a doughnut. Life owed him one, didn't it? It owed him a future free of misery.

He pried his eyes open, head thumping with the distant beat of the August UKF Dubstep Mix that slid faintly up through the packed floors. The liquid waited for him, showing him more. Flashes of Magnus, of his family, of eternity slid before his eyes.

_O-O-O_

_"It's called The House of Plenty. It's like a club for warlock's," Magnus says, sitting on the edge of the bed._

_I rest my chin on my knees, eyes on my toes. This conversation is always present, but we're not allowed to talk about it. Stupid near-death experiences. You always make everything so tragic. "So we just go there and they make me... any time?"_

_Magnus shakes his head. "Not exactly. There's a whole process. It takes a couple of weeks and you have to start it on your birthday." He makes a face. "And I have to pay them, but that's not really a big deal."_

_"How much?"_

_The obviousness of my lame attempt at a subject change makes me cringe. "The money isn't the point. Alec, do you at least want to try?"_

_And I can see it in his eyes. He wants me to try, to go with him and make my decision. And the part of me that isn't denying this is necessary really wants to. I'm afraid of the future. I'm afraid of dying without him. I'm afraid of so many things about the future that I feel sick thinking about it. More than that, I'm afraid of living forever. I'm afraid of never seeing my family again wherever we end up when we die._

_"Okay," I say. "I'll go."_

_O-O-O_

Alec tried to look at the time on his phone, but Magnus grabbed his wrist. "You have time," he said. "I'll let you know when we're running out."

He made a noise of agreement, knowing full well what would happen if he thought of the time while looking into the liquid. Still, the thought couldn't help but burst into his head at the last moment. He was supposed to be thinking of his choice, of immortality - that was what The Insight was for, after all. It was to help him clearly recall the events that had led him to this point. But Alec couldn't concentrate on the facts anymore.

So he thought about the time.

_O-O-O  
_

_Despite the fact that I've been panicking about this moment for weeks, I'm actually a little relieved to arrive at The House of Plenty with Magnus. Even though there's a part, Magnus isn't smiling. He's wearing his serious clothes - plain black pants, plain white t-shirt, and a sweater he stole from me. He's trying not to draw me away from the decision, the one I've yet to finalize, but it's hard not to be biased when he's wearing my clothes. _

_The House of Plenty is actually a house. I half expected it to be a warehouse or a functional shoe factory or the underside of a bridge or something. It's not. It's just a giant house covered in skulls and sprinkled with gambling, drinking, and potions making. Magnus takes me away from the throngs of people, dancing to disturbingly addictive music, up a flight of stairs. The banister is knotted with loops of hair, all different colours. The upstairs has less people - if you can call them people - and smells like thick incense, roofing tar, and sulfur. I choke on it. Magnus doesn't seem to notice._

_He leads me up another flight of stairs, this one narrow, and come face to face with a large horned man. "Name?"_

_"Magnus Bane."_

_A smile lights up his rough face. It somehow makes him uglier. "The Lady is waiting for you. Don't worry about your screams echoing - the walls are stuffed with the bones of a thousand gullible men."_

_Magnus raises his eyebrows. "Charming."  
_

_The man opens the door and we find ourselves in an attic. The walls are hung with dark silks and the floor is covered in soft, strange rug wherever it lacks beaded pillows - which is rare. A thin woman sits in the center of the room. She stands up when we enter. _

_"Magnus Bane?" she asks, and he nods."I see. I'll leave you to it. Money?"_

_A thick wad of bills appears in his left hand and I can't help but gasp. "You didn't say it would cost that much!"_

_He shrugs. "Honey, it's nothing. Really. Think of it as an extremely stressful birthday present." _

_The woman takes it and then reaches over to touch the Portal waiting for her. "You have one hour." And then she slides through and is gone._

_O-O-O_

The facts were slipping away like wet sand through his cupped hands. His thoughts kept running in circles - life and death, for now and for eternity. Family versus Magnus, right versus wrong, magic versus nature... he couldn't take it anymore! And what good was The Insight doing? All it showed him were pointless moments in the recent past. He could remember those moments perfectly fine and they didn't matter!

Where was the epiphany? When would he be able to make up his damn mind? Why did it always take him forever to figure out what he wanted?

He always thought he worked well under pressure, but that seemed to be a lie. He wasn't working well at all. Not with Magnus sitting so close and the music so loud and the clock tick-tick-ticking away.

It was always ticking, wasn't it? That was what this whole thing was about, really. The damn clock. It raced by in that hour, in the six weeks leading up to that moment. And it was ticking away at his youth, at their time together. He just wanted to stop the damn clock and give himself more time to think!

And there it was - Alec wanted to stop the clock.

_O-O-O_

_"Do you love me more than sleeping in?"_

_"Yes'm."_

_"Do you love me more than putting cheese on your macaroni?"_

_"Of course!"_

_"Do you love me more than glitter?"_

_"Now let's not get carried away, Alec..."_

_I laugh and chuck the afghan hanging over the back of the couch at his head. He catches it and winks. It makes me melt a little on the inside. It also makes me supremely jealous because I can't wink gracefully. Whenever I try it looks like my contacts are falling out. "I've been out done by reflective specks of dust," I sigh._

_"Come on," he nudges me with his foot. "Yes, I love you more than glitter. However, I'm not going to disclose how much you've won by."_

_And this is where I'm happy. Not with blinding hot passion or carefully crafted romance, but with silly, sweet games. Sunny Saturday's with nothing but teasing Magnus, baking cookies, watching old movies, listening to him talk about people I'm never going to meet. Playing with his cat, stealing sweaters from each other, having him force me to play with everything in a toy store. That time he took me out of New York to try a trampoline. Admiring cupcakes in London, drinking at a cafe in Paris, making snow angels in Stockholm. Water balloon fights, that time we laughed for an hour straight because of that really ugly baby we saw, going to the movies, shouting at famous people I never knew - and still doubt - existed. _

_I love Magnus. I love everything about him. I  
_

_O-O-O_

"Don't want time to run out," Alec mumbled.

Magnus perked up. "Pardon?"

Alec let himself breathe for a moment. He let it come in and go out.

_You can't reap the reward if you don't take the risk,_ he thought.

"I'm ready." The words were thick in the heavily perfumed room. He found Magnus's hand and squeezed it tight. "For forever."

**FIN.**

**

* * *

**_You__ like? Tell me what you thought of my rendition of Magnus and Alec's future in a comment!_

_-Cara  
_


	2. Serum I

_Continuation - Serum I. There are six serums. Enjoy.  
_

* * *

**Serum I**

_Breathe in, breathe out. This is the beginning._

The Hollow Lady peeled away from the wall the moment one hour ran out. She snapped her thin, twiggy fingers and The Insight disappeared. Magnus swallowed hard, not taking his eyes off of Alec's face. This was the last place he wanted to take Alec on his birthday. Six weeks wasn't enough time, he knew. Another year would have been better. Or two, or three. And maybe Alec would have had that time if he was a mundane - but he wasn't. He was a Shadowhunter and every day they didn't talk or think or acknowledge his painfully present mortality was another day spent teetering on the edge of oblivion, praying to God that Alec wouldn't fall off.

It was putting a major damper on Magnus's romancing.

Alec didn't see the Lady, but Magnus knew he could feel her, staring at his back with her cold green eyes. Magnus was old - The Hollow Lady was ancient. But she was also fairly good spirited when it came to love, which was why the only token she'd asked for was money.

"A decision?" she asked.

"I'll do it," Alec whispered. He squeezed Magnus's hand so tight his knuckles turned white. "I want to do it."

A thin smile spread on her narrow face. "Good boy. Money?"

Magnus leaned back to reach his wallet, rolling his eyes. He pulled on the little disco ball zipper and yet another wad of cash spilled out. Of course he'd earned that money by conjuring things out of Tiffany's and selling them to less than desirable, fairly oily men in creaky boats, but whatever. Money was money. Alec avoided looking at it as he tossed the bills at The Hollow Lady. She caught it and tucked it inside her shirt. After a moment of silent deliberation she picked her way over to the low sideboard beneath the stain glass attic windows. The skylight creaked open with a flick of her wrist, allowing cold air and moonlight to flood down around Alec. The boy shivered and Magnus bit his lip.

"Are you okay?" asked Magnus. A big part of him wanted to ask 'Are you sure?', but he knew that would only complicate things.

Alec nodded. They met eyes, Alec's twinkling a bit. "This isn't going to turn me into a camel or anything, right?"

"Ew. Camel's spit."

A glass vial clinked sharply and Alec jumped a foot in the air. "Okay, I'm a bit nervous," he admitted.

"Don't be," said the Lady as she turned around. She had a dimly glowing black goblet in one hand and a decanter filled with dark violet liquid in the other. "You're Shadowhunter, right?" Alec nodded and The Hollow Lady looked grave. "This will be difficult then. The blood of the Angel rejects our magic in this form. You will most likely be ill for the first week."

"Okay."

And then it began.

_O-O-O_

The woman pushed her silk shawl off of her shoulders and stretched a pair of thin wings with crumpled, off white feathers. They fluttered in the moonlight and the rested gently against her shoulders. Her eyes fixed on Alec's face, she poured the liquid into the goblet while speaking that strange language Magnus was fluent in - Warlock speak. Thick steam rose out of the Goblet. It smelled sweet and familiar. The moonlight seemed to get brighter and he felt his skin tingle, but that was probably all in his head. He searched for Magnus's face past the glare of the moon and saw that his boyfriend's head was bowed reverently.

Oh God. What had he gotten himself into?

Alec wiped the sweat from his forehead. Why was he sweating? It was so cold with that damn window open. The Lady set the goblet down in the center of the table and began to trace glowing blue lines around it on the surface of the table. It looked like some of the things Magnus drew, only older. And the words she was saying came faster, louder. Suddenly a hot wind picked up and swirled around the table. The dim glow of the goblet grew until it was hazy, as though he was seeing it through water.

Her face lit with blue from the sparks, the woman said, "Breathe in, breathe out. This is the beginning, Alexander Lightwood."

And he did just that. He inhaled slowly and then exhaled in a long gust, like he was trying to hold off a panic attack. This was it. This was the moment. Immortality was just a step away. For a moment his nerve wavered. He grabbed Magnus's hand and found his eyes again. They were so bright, so happy, even though he was trying to look impassive. Magnus was just as good at holding his feelings back as Alec - only Alec knew how to find them. This decision wasn't his - it was theirs. The only reason he was doing this was because he wanted to share Magnus's life.

"Take the goblet and drink when you're ready," said the woman.

Alec felt the corners of his mouth curl up. He let go of Magnus and took the was ready.

Now, Alec had some experience in drinking potions. It was a side effect of being an indiscriminate food whore in a Warlock's kitchen. But of all the spiked drinks and cakes and cabbage rolls he'd ingested, nothing matched the Elixir of Eternal Life. Although all of the food he'd eaten at Magnus's tasted like food, he knew he was in trouble the moment it was down his throat. Before the fur and the antennae came, the potioned food seemed to turn waxy and wrong.

Not the Elixir.

He pulled the cup back after draining it, making a face. "Grape juice?" he asked. Warm grape juice at that. Ugh.

"Grape Kool-Aid, actually," the woman chuckled - if you could call it a chuckle. She sounded a bit like a set of bagpipes getting stepped on. "It was the first thing I saw in the icebox."

_Icebox?_ he thought.

"The magic is in the cup, the moon, and the birthday - not in the liquid. The Kool-Aid is just a transfer agent," Magnus explained.

Alec set the cup back on the table and stared down at his arms. "I don't feel any different."

And that was when the potion hit him. The sudden urge to vomit, sleep, die, and hit his head against the wall struck all at once with enough force to flatten him on his back. A screaming headache overtook him and all of his veins felt like they were splitting. It was no where near 'sick'. It was agony. It was a demon attack multiplied a thousand times. Before his body forced him into unconsciousness, he saw a pair of cat eyes hovering above him.

The first step to forever. No words Justin Bieber knew could begin to explain how terrible forever felt.

_O-O-O_

Three days later, the sickness had petered out into something that resembled the flu. Alec was tucked into his bed at home, bored out of his mind. His head hurt too much to read but too little to sleep. Alec was painfully aware that a new episode of The Office was playing that night and he wouldn't be able to see it. Curse Magnus for getting him addicted to TV. Magnus had visited him of course, each time looking a little less guilty. Now that he didn't appear to be on the verge of death, Magnus was sending him a million texts a day, swearing that next year he would make his birthday the best day of his life. Now that his life was going to be significantly longer, he could only imagine what that birthday was going to be like.

Maybe there would be fondue. Alec loved fondue.

He put his phone on silent and covered his eyes with the cool side of his damp cloth. If he slept more he'd get better faster, and if he got better faster he'd be able to get back out sooner. Isabelle, Jace and Clary needed him to be healthy. For all of his faults, at least Alec had some common sense. God knew that Jace and Clary had none.

Alec was almost asleep when his door creaked. He peered one eye open and then fought back a grimace at the cloth obscuring his vision. Luckily enough, knew by smell who it was. His mother's perfume floated over to his bed as she picked up his puke bucket and then drifted away as she took it to the toilet in his little bathroom. On her way back she cursed. "Alexander," she whispered to herself. "The moment you're better, you're cleaning this damned pigsty of a room."

The bucket thudded lightly beside him and the mattress dipped where she sat at the edge. Part of him wanted to acknowledge her, but the majority of his mind just wanted to sleep. He felt her cold fingers skim his forehead and rest lightly, like she was checking his temperature. With a little tisking noise she pulled her hand away. And then her lips gently pressed against his unwashed hair.

"My poor little Alec," she sighed. "Always getting the flu."

Minutes later, the door clicked shut and Alec didn't know whether or not he should feel guilty about what he'd done.

* * *

_I'm sorry for the Justin Bieber... You think your town has Bieber Fever? Come live in Ontario. Ugh._

_This is probably completely unrelated and something you don't care about at all. The other day I was sick and my mom came into my room to clean out my sick pail, and as she was leaving she tripped over a stack of books. My Froot Loops ended up all over my Percy Jackson poster. :(_

_-Cara  
_


	3. Serum II

**Serum II**

_Time's a stupid thing.  
_

Exactly one week after his birthday Alec and Magnus had to meet again at The House of Plenty.

That was all Alec could think about. It followed him wherever he went, like a weight pressing between his shoulder blades. Even when he wasn't thinking about it, he was still thinking about it. It made no sense but it was true. He would be in the middle of one of their mandatory post-Max dinners or sharpening his blades, thinking about how burnt his salad was or whether or not the knife was up to standards, all the while being pressed on by this tension.

Was he second guessing his decision? It sure felt like it.

And then he would get a text from Magnus and remember why he was going through with it.

"Feeling good enough to spar?" Jace asked across the kitchen island. Somehow he had managed to have an appetite after Isabelle's 'Super Special Flambe Salad' the night before and was shoveling cereal into his mouth. "I invented a new move. It's called The Fulcrum of Doom."

"Yes, I'm good enough to spar and no, I'm not going to let you try The Fulcrum of Doom on me."

Frowning, Jace began to form a rebuttal, only to be interrupted.

"You can give it as many names as you want - kicking someone in their... sensitive areas is kicking someone in their sensitive areas."

The other boy slurped his milk and tossed the bowl in the ever growing dirty dishes pile. "That's not what The Fulcrum of Doom is."

Alec raised his eyebrows and set his pen on top of the crossword puzzle he'd been doing. "Oh yeah? That's what you said about The Apex of Suffering, The Mighty Pendulum of Thor, and The Strike of the Kangaroo."

"Oh come on. Have a little faith."

_O-O-O_

A half an hour later, they were in the training room, stretching. Or at least Alec was. Jace seemed to think that limbering up was below the skills of a Shadowhunter - which explained most of his pulled muscles. Of course, being the stubborn mule that he was, Alec stretched alone while Jace took out some of his energy on a punching bag. The fact that he was putting absolutely no leg into it was making Alec a little uneasy. He was luring him into a false sense of security.

Alec did a couple of lunges, his knees feeling a little weak, studiously ignoring the pressure of the coming Saturday.

"So, how's Sparkles the Wonder Cat doing?" asked Jace between punches. Much akin to his creative aversions for 'I'm going to creatively kick you in the family jewels', Jace had a million different names for Magnus. Sparkles the Wonder Cat was one of Alec's personal favourites, though he would never admit it. "Is he off cursing that restaurant that gave you food poisoning?"

Alec shrugged, realized Jace wasn't looking at him, and said, "He's working a lot."

It was true. Both times Alec had gone to visit him, his boyfriend had been too busy shouting at his phone in either Portuguese or Spanish. Whatever it was, it got pretty heated and forced Alec to leave early both times.

"What did he get you for your birthday?"

Alec blanched. _Immortality_. Magnus had given him eternal life for his birthday. But Alec couldn't say that. It wasn't time to tell anyone. Besides, the deal wasn't done yet. He still had over five more weeks to go until it was official.

"One of those music things with the Apple on the back," Alec finally said. "It's at his apartment though. I couldn't figure out how to turn it on."

"Cool." Jace finally kicked the bag as hard as he could and it went swinging. Alec winced. "I thought he would've gotten you something... I don't know, more extravagant."

"What made you think that?"

Jace laughed and kicked the bag twice more before finishing it off with a Roundhouse that would have made Chuck Norris run screaming. Uh oh. "What did he get you last year?"

"This necklace." He pointed to the gold chain with the sword dangling around his throat. "And he threw that party..."

"Oh, you mean the one where the drag queen jumped out of the cake?" he asked innocently.

Alec flushed. "Shut up."

That had been a poor decision on Magnus's part. Surprises + Shadowhunters = disaster. Similarly: the prospect of eating cake (linebacker wearing a dress) + Jace holding a plate = makeshift shuriken's and thankfully ruined drywall.

The room fell silent, broken with Jace's punching and Alec's joints cracking and popping. It felt like he'd gone twenty rounds with a dragon. All of his muscles burned just a little bit too much. He grimaced. At least his veins didn't burn anymore. That had been the worst part. It had been as if the magic was settling right into his blood - which it probably was. The woman with the wings had said that he would only be sick the first time, right? It was probably just the magic fighting with the Angel's blood. Oh hell, that was a disturbing thought in itself, wasn't it? The Angel's blood was what made him a Shadowhunter. Was this ruining him? Alec stopped stretching, trying to gather up all of his thoughts. Magic wasn't evil. Some of it was, but not all of it. Magnus would know which was which, right? He was a warlock.

Alec didn't _feel _evil. He just felt sore and a little nauseous. Of course, the latter was just Isabelle's salad conjealing somewhere inside of him. Why did he trust her cooking?

"Ready?"

"Yep."

They both got into the beginning pose - arms at their sides, legs spread a little, hands in loose fists, and eyes on the target. Alec was ready to be defeated. His heart just wasn't in the spar. Jace flitted forward and took a swipe, which Alec dodged easily. He dropped down into a crouch and kicked out at Jace's legs. The other boy jumped up and landed a few feet back. Alec did a quick somersault over to him, springing straight up from his crouch, and made a grab for Jace's right arm, hoping to incapacitate him. But Jace was too quick. He seemed to sense what Alec was going to do before he did it and grabbed both of his wrists.

And then came The Fulcrum of Doom.

Jace jerked Alec towards himself and then pushed him away just as quickly, knocking him off his balance. His hands let go of Alec's wrists and he jumped up into the air, doing a complicated scissor kick aimed at poor Alec's nether regions. Normally it would have made contact, leaving Alec swearing profusely on the floor, curled up in a ball while Jace praised his new rendition of the cheapest shot in the book. That didn't happen though. Alec managed to drop down enough for the kick to make contact with his stomach and what followed confused him tenfold.

Jace's foot hit him with enough force to knock him flying back onto the mats - but it didn't hurt. It was as though he'd been tossed instead of thrown. If Jace would have been paying attention, he would have seen the faint blue glow seeping from underneath Alec's black t-shirt. But he couldn't because he was falling backwards with a fractured ankle.

Alec sat up immediately and lifted his shirt. He only saw his scarred torso and the faintest traces of blue receding back into his skin. Completely shocked, he scrambled over to Jace's side. "Are you alright?" he asked.

The Shadowhunter made a sideways sort of face and gently lifted his knee to his chest. He tapped his ankle and hid a wince. "You have broken me. I am damaged," he said. Dread filled his chest for a moment. What had happened? It was the Elixir. It had to be the Elixir. And then he remembered how Jace had gotten hurt. He slapped him on the arm with the back of his hand as hard as he could. Jace glared at him. "What was that for?"

"You said you weren't going to kick me there!" he cried. And then he stood up and left the room in a huff.

_O-O-O_

Magnus picked him up Saturday afternoon. Apparently the second Serum of the Elixir had to be taken at three o'clock exactly. Magic made little sense to Alec. How did they figure out all of these dates and times? It seemed ridiculous to him. The taxi ride there was filled with talk about nothing. Both were obviously avoiding the fact that Alec was actually becoming immortal, and not just because the Mundie cab driver was blatantly listening in on their hushed conversation.

Somehow The House of Plenty looked more intimidating in the light of day. It seemed more real, somehow. The whole thing seemed like it was actually happening. Magnus slid his hand into Alec's back pocket as they walked up the footpath. It was probably supposed to be supportive, but Alec was certain he was just feeling up his butt. The whole thing just turned awkward when Alec tried to return the favour, only to discover that Magnus didn't have back pockets. Of course, that had to occur right as the man from the attic the night before opened the door.

"Huh," the man said, his eyes drawn straight to the blatant hand-to-butt contact. "The Lady is waiting for you in the attic."

Magnus laughed at Alec and they went inside.

Even at 2:47 on a Saturday afternoon, The House of Plenty was filled with people. Sure, it wasn't to the same extent it had been, but there were still warlocks drinking and gambling and smoking multicoloured cigarettes. They were trading things, too. Things that might have been illegal if Alec had the nerve to look closer. They all seemed to sense he was a Shadowhunter. It made his skin crawl. He shrugged closer to Magnus, knowing that he was completely safe as long as he stayed close. There was no way one Shadowhunter could handle all those warlocks...

The upstairs looked much the same as it had a week before, only with light streaming in the dirty windows. Alec could see the pentagrams and warlock runes scribbled all over the walls and the various magic items strewn on tables made of bone. Everything was coated in ash and dirt, though the mess truly had nothing on Magnus's shoe closet. Who knew someone could own enough shoes to require a whole room to keep them?

The door to the attic was open and Magnus walked right in like he owned the place. The Lady had her back to them, her wings hidden beneath her shawl again. There was a disturbing translucence to her skin in the daylight. It made Alec feel a little sick. Would Magnus look like that someday - so eerie and breakable, like a spirit barely clinging on to the waking world? He pushed the thought away. Magnus was too vibrant to waste away in some attic.

"You survived," the Lady noted without turning from her bone sideboard. "You appeared half dead when you left."

Alec pushed away the thought of the Elixir killing him and nodded to himself. "I'm better."

"The time?" the Lady asked, seeming to ignore Alec.

Magnus answered - they had exactly ten minutes. The Lady finally turned, a new brass coloured goblet in her spidery fingers. Alec fought back a gasp. Sunlight from the uncovered skylight fell over her skin, allowing him to trace the blue veins that covered her body almost completely. With a muffled sense of disgust he realized that her skin was completely see-through, like tracing paper. Magnus didn't seem to notice. He took the same cushion as last time and patted the one next to him for Alec.

The Lady folded herself elegantly and set the cup in the center of the table. Runes were already drawn, though they didn't glow, and the liquid in the cup was black and fizzy. "Diet Pepsi," she revealed. He would have assumed she drank baby blood or the dew off of flowers after the full moon."Have you brought your tokens?"

Alec began to say no, but Magnus stopped him. He pulled something out of the lime green fanny pack that rested on his hip. It was a little carved soldier on a chain, wooden and rounded with age. Magnus kissed the soldier and set it in the center of the spiral in front of him. His side of the table began to glow. "I made that," he told Alec. "When I was seven." He straightened the soldier, rubbing its face with his thumb. "I used to sit in the barn and cut them out of rotting firewood. This is the only one left. I magicked him so he wouldn't rot." Magnus pulled his hand away from it and smiled sadly. "Time's a stupid thing."

His eyebrows flew up and he squinted a little at the solider. It was featureless and the uniform, without paint, was unrecognizable. An English soldier from the 1200's. Alec swallowed. "I didn't bring anything special."

"What do you have in your pockets?" asked Magnus.

Feeling a little foolish for not bringing anything, he pulled his pockets inside out. He had his Metro card and seventy-four cents. Oh, and a button that fell off of his second favourite sweater. "I have my necklace..."

Magnus pointed at the button. "Kiss that and put it on the table."

He did as he was told, wondering why it didn't matter what he gave up. The button worked all the same. Light flared on the table and the Lady began tracing more lines, speaking in warlock tongue. Magnus was staring down at his knees, listening attentively. "And now," she whispered, "we bow our heads and think of the Great Mother, Lilith."

That was when Alec became officially uncomfortable with the whole thing. Yes, he loved Magnus with all of his heart and all of his brain, but he was a Shadowhunter. He didn't pray to demons. That wasn't part of the deal. The Angel Raziel was the Great One, if he had to say there was a Great One at all. Everything suddenly felt wrong. What was he really doing? Selling his soul to a demon?

A hand rested gently over his, golden and thin. He peeked up at Magnus, who had his eyes half closed. They looked so _old_. The years were seeping through whether he liked it or not. A demon... No demon would create a face like that. They wouldn't be able to forge a soul that pure or a heart that big. He had seen demons before. Slayed them, cleaned up after them, watched them helplessly as they destroyed... That was something else. Whatever it was, it hadn't created Magnus.

Lilith or no Lilith, this was the magic of Downworlder's - not demons. So when Alec bowed his head, he wasn't thinking of some Greater Demon Mother. He was thinking about Magnus. About his hair and his laugh and how he could make a bad day good without even trying. And when he couldn't fix the bad days, he was still always there. Waiting. Poor Magnus was always waiting. He thought about Magnus and the spell held up on his end. Serum II didn't need worship of the Great Mother. It just needed love and sacrifice.

They sat there in silent meditation for several minute. The light of the table grew and grew until it hurt Alec's eyes through his lids. He managed to pry them open against his better judgment and watched as the button and the soldier turned to dust and swirled around the goblet. They twined together and swirled out of the skylight, into the sunny afternoon.

"Drink," demanded the Lady.

Alec drank. The pop had gone a little bit flat, but he drank the whole thing. The metal of the cup was warm, even though the soda was ice cold. He felt it chill his insides as it went down. The chill stayed, spreading out through his arms and his legs. He was shivering as he set the cup back down on the table. It chased away all of the pain from before and made his spine tingle in the strangest of ways. It was like there were little caterpillars sliding across his bones. Without thinking about it, he leaned into Magnus. It didn't hurt, really, but it was unpleasant.

When Magnus touched his skin the cold receded until he couldn't feel it anymore. All was silent in the attic and the cold leeched out of his system, leaving him one step closer to immortality.

_O-O-O_

"Alec?"

"Yeah?"

"I love you."

"I love you. too."

And the cab took them home.

* * *

_Who knows what The Fulcrum of Doom is from?_


	4. Serum III

_The Fulcrum of Doom is from Dawn of the Dreadfuls, the prequel to Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.

* * *

_

**Serum III**

_You can't have everything you want._

"I always pass this thing and I never think to use it."

Alec nodded and grunted as he continued to do the majority of the pedaling. "I usually take one out when I need time to think," he said. "Usually there's a lot less weight to propel..." He began to turn them around so that they were heading out into the middle of the green man-made lake. The yellowing swan they were sitting in wasn't exactly the sea vessel Magnus was dressed for. In fact, he looked like he was heading out on an all male cruise in his tight sailor suit. If anyone asked Alec, his boyfriend was on break from working at an underwater themed kid's restaurant.

Magnus got the point and his immaculate beige Rugged Shark loafers lifted off the floor and began helping once again. "I thought Shadowhunter's were supposed to be super strong."

"I feel like spaghetti," he said.

"Like starch and wheat?"

Alec snorted gracelessly. "Oh, shut up!" He play hit Magnus, noting that his arm felt like a noodle - limp and soggy. But there was no way he was going to explain it fully to Magnus. That would make him worried, which would end with Alec spending the rest of the afternoon lying on a couch with a glittering thermometer in his mouth, legs bent awkwardly to rest in a tub of hot water. Once Alec had had a terrible cold while he was at Magnus's and woke up with a picture perfect clear coat pedicure. What a fight that was.

He was dragged out of his reverie when Magnus's head rested gently on his shoulder. He remembered a time not so long ago when he would have turned red and pushed him away, most likely ending with them both screaming at each other in the water. Three years wiser, Alec simply sighed contently and leaned into him. They let the boat drift, Magnus's hand sliding down Alec's wrist to clasp his hand. It was so sunny and warm. Alec closed his eyes and saw pink. With his eyes shut tight, he imagined an eternity of that moment stretching on and on and on...

_You can't have everything you want, Alec._

He didn't know where the thought came from, but he tried to push it away as hard and as fast as he could. Too late. The thought was there and it wasn't going any time soon. His eyes opened and he jerked away from Magnus. Central Park swung dizzily as Alec began to heave for air. His heart was pounding so hard he thought it was going to burst and his muscles tensed up. He was dying. Oh Angel, he was dying in a paddle boat at the age of 21, four steps away from immortality.

"Alec, what's happening? What's wrong?" asked Magnus. Alec saw the look of pure panic directed at him. The pedals sparked with blue lightning and the boat took off at mach 50 for the shore.

Alec couldn't answer him because he couldn't take a full breath. Pain flowered in his chest, making each breath tear through shallowly. And then suddenly he understood what was happening - he was having a panic attack.

The last time Alec had had one was when he was sixteen and Jace found a letter he had written to Mr. Darcy from Pride and Prejudice. Not only was it supremely lame that he'd written a letter to a fictional character, he took it up a notch by describing how perfectly tailored he was to Alec. It was meant to only leave the confines of the locked drawer in his room to be burned at a later date - he should have known that Jace would choose the one fortified spot in the entire room to go snooping for blackmail material. When he saw Jace pull it out of his pocket at dinner his lungs had shriveled and his heart had nearly exploded. The whole thing was dropped once Alec had an almost heart attack on the weapon's room floor. Jace wrote it off as a joke. Alec prayed that that was true.

Magnus heaved him out of the beached swan by his underarms and dropped him unceremoniously on the sand. He wasn't the strongest fork in the drawer. The panic was ebbing just as quickly as it had come. People were staring, but that didn't matter much. Nothing mattered in the wake of a panic attack other than finding the cause. The cause, though, found him. It was that thought. It was that terrible, horrible, pessimistic thought. Alec couldn't get everything he wanted. There was no such thing as a happy ending. Something was going to ruin it. He could feel it in his bones.

_O-O-O_

"Happy endings exist, Alec," Magnus assured him.

They were huddled together on the warlocks couch, Alec wrapped in a blanket even though it was plenty warm out. The sun was lowering on Brooklyn and Chairman Meow was playing in the fading reflections thrown off of the glass. "That's what I used to think," was all Alec muttered.

That wasn't enough for he warlock. He resettled himself on the couch and rested a hand on his boyfriend's knee. "Okay, how about this. The other day I was in the Times Square and I saw this old tourist couple buying I Heart New York t-shirts for each other."

Alec waited for the rest of the story, but it never came. "And?" he asked.

Magnus smiled. "That's it. They have each other and they have their traveling. That seems like a pretty happy way to live."

"But it isn't an end."

"One day it will be." Magnus pecked Alec on the cheek and stretched out, resting his head in his boyfriend's lap. He played with the edge of the blanket, staring up at Alec. There was something unbelievably beautiful about his face when he looked at him, his eyes widened. It was one of the few times the mischievous glint left his eyes. "Don't you think that would be a happy ending? Spending forever with someone you love?"

Alec pushed the blanket back and began absently playing with Magnus's hair. "That's not the point. Happy endings exist for other people. I'm a Shadowhunter. I don't get to have everything I want."

"And I'm sure you won't," he said, eyes closing at the welcomed scalp massage. "I see what you're talking about. You think that you can't have happiness without suffering, only you're overestimating how much you're going to suffer."

"You don't know that."

He leaned his head back, mouth tilting up at the corners. Alec was curling his hair around his fingers and leaving it twisted like that, watching it fluff back out. He'd toned down the gel that day - sailor's have limited amounts of hair product available, apparently. "I'm old, sweetie. I know the percentage of suffering that comes with immortality. You watch people you care about grow old and die while you're tethered to the spot - but that doesn't mean you don't have a happy ending."

Alec shook his head.

"Oh, don't be negative. You're such a Raincloud sometimes."

"But I'm your Raincloud," he smirked. "Invest in an umbrella - I'm anti-optimistic."

Magnus's laughing was swallowed up quickly by Alec's mouth.

_O-O-O_

The attic of The House of Plenty was slowly making it to the top of Alec's Most Hated Places lists. The Hollow Lady (Magnus had told him her name and the nasty story attached to it three days earlier) wasn't there yet, though Hockensmith, the meat-headed warlock's apprentice who was always hanging around in doorways, said she would be along shortly. Alec fidgeted on his cushion, fighting the urge to look at his phone. Couldn't this whole thing hurry up? Jace and Isabelle needed him to help with a particularly nasty gang of rogue vampires. He'd lied, saying that Magnus also needed him that same night. He'd been replaced by the not-so-Mundie Mundie kid, Simon. The thought made him grimace.

"It'll be over soon," Magnus said. "Then we'll go help."

Alec stopped rocking back and forth like a madman and perked up. "You're coming?" As much as Magnus wanted to help, it wasn't exactly smart for business to run around messing with Downworlder's. Dating a Shadowhunter was one thing; acting like one was another.

Magnus nodded. "What if the serum makes you all weird? We wouldn't want that on the job, now would we?"

The Hollow Lady didn't appear, but suddenly the cup was there and the table was flaring. Alec nearly jumped out of his skin. Her voice hissed through the room in warlocks tongue, making each and every hair on Alec's body stand on end. He looked to Magnus for guidance. He didn't seem to notice how freaky it all was.

"She's out on business, but I needed to finish this one anyways." Magnus leaned over the table and tapped the four edges lightly.

The blue light turned faint green and the stone goblet shook. Ancient words slid out of Magnus's mouth and into the cup, lighting the carved runes green. The way his mouth moved, forming the words that seemed to vibrate every inch of the room, was almost a magic in itself. His hand reached out over the cup and his left hand flicked so fast that Alec didn't realize what had happened. By the time the image of the knife dragging across his palm caught up with his brain, Magnus already had the cut covered with a handkerchief. The light turned rusty red and then slowly died.

"I have to drink your blood?" he asked with a look of disgust.

Magnus rolled his eyes. "My blood tastes like apple juice."

"Really?"

He snorted. "No. It tastes like blood. Just drink it."

Alec flushed and took the heavy stone goblet from the table. Ironically enough the majority of the liquid was apple juice, though Alec couldn't help but imagine he tasted the metallic tang of his boyfriend's blood. It was one of those things he'd hoped he'd never do, right up there with seeing Magnus in a bright yellow thong. At least he'd avoided the latter.

A warm tingling spread over him, like he was coming in from the cold. The weird limp feeling flooded out of his arms and legs, leaving the faint traces of muscle burn. He liked muscle burn. It told him that he'd been doing his job as a Shadowhunter - running and jumping and fighting and _moving_. He set the cup back on the table, noting how it felt lighter. Was this how Jace felt all of the time? Like there was a fire burning inside of him, begging him to be active? Something like that had to be present to force someone to do so much. Alec didn't feel the same compulsion that his brother did. He liked the active part of the job, but had never felt a compulsion to do it.

Now he did.

But before he could say anything his phone rang. He flipped it open and pressed it against his ear, feeling like he was going to break it. Jesus, was he _pumped_.

"Alec! Things got messy! We need - "

He slammed the phone shut on Isabelle and jumped straight up onto his feet. "Come on, they need us," he said, and then started running out the door. Magnus struggled to keep up with him all the way to the Lower East Side.

* * *

_Sometimes when I read my own FanFic's I cringe because of how bad my grammar is. So thank you all for putting up with my lack of motivation to edit. :)_


	5. Serum IV

_During Alec's epic moment in this I like to imagine I Need A Hero by Bonnie Tyler was playing._

* * *

**Serum IV**

_You must wish for death with all your heart and all your soul. Only then will it come to you._

Alec could feel the vampires before he saw them. He could smell them and taste them, too. And he could hear their hearts not beating. Isabelle and Jace were irrelevant, as was Simon the Vampire. As was Magnus. As was everything. His clothes were so itchy. Were they too tight? Why did he wear so much black? He needed them _off_. So that was what he did. He hopped over the curb, bolting towards the abandoned lot behind the empty warehouse, tearing his sweater off.

_O-O-O_

Jace was panting, Simon was complaining, and Izzy was trying to keep on fighting while simultaneously calling her brother. There had been three more vampires than they initially thought, and though they had them cornered and two were dead for good, it was still too much. The stalemate wasn't going to stay for much longer - they were getting tired and there was no telling what a pack of rabid, savage rouge vampire's would do if they had the chance.

When they heard Alec's Bohemian Rhapsody ringtone screaming from his back pocket, all three turned and stopped. The vampires probably would have taken that as their chance to attack if what they saw hadn't confused them so badly.

Around the corner came Alec, running close to the speed of light, bare-chested and trying desperately to tug his jeans down - which he succeeded at. The seraph blade in his left hand was ablaze, a roar ripping through his throat. He leaped into the air and brought his blade down into the heart of the first vampire and then laughed maniacally. The other vampire's caught on to the program and chased after Alec, who slipped over a fence and took off down another alley.

The two Shadowhunter's and the vampire stared after him in shock and then ran after Alec.

Seventy-four seconds later, a seriously winded warlock, arms full of clothes, huffed his way down the alley and grabbed his boyfriend's pants. He slowed down as he entered the lot, spotted the fence, and swore profusely. This was going to be a long night. With a flick of his wrist, the metal caught on fire and disintegrated. The chase continued.

_O-O-O_

Alec was flying through a whirlwind of candy cane and oxygen. His feet were like bars of wet soap - no, they were like rockets. No, they _were _rockets. Alec was a rocket. No, he was going too fast! He didn't want to go into orbit! Especially not when the Spice Girls were on board. He didn't like the Spice Girls. He stopped running and was immediately lost. There were people everywhere, all of them looking at him. He felt his arms and his legs and shouted in triumph, "I'M NOT A ROCKET SHIP!"

But he could feel the vampires behind him, so he didn't celebrate. He started running again until he was in an empty street. The warehouses on either side were dark and the streetlights were dim. Alec jumped behind a garbage can and waited. He was the predator. The prey would come to him. He watched as the vampires arrived and immediately picked up his scent. Alec had no time to think. He was too busy cooling his jets. All he could do was act on the impulses being sent through his brain. The vampires were so shimmery - how could the garbage can not find them? He let out his tribal call again and chucked the bin at them before throwing his knife.

It buried itself deep in one of the vampire's hearts and they were no more. Alec pulled his spare blade out of his underwear and charged forward. The vampires backed up, staring at each other. Alec was too much of a warrior, too much for them to handle. He made several yipping noises and then continued his siege. One of the vampire's suddenly choked and expired, Jace standing behind it. The other ran, only to meet Isabelle and Simon.

Jace had his hands out, his blade at his feet, showing that he was defenseless. "Alec, put down the knife." Only to Alec it sounded a lot like, "Whomp whomp whomp whomp."

He backed up, his teeth bared. Why was it so hot out? "I always liked Baby Spice more. Posh was a snob," he muttered to himself, shaking his head so that Spice Up Your Life would stop playing in his ears. "And Sporty was too manly. I like men, but she was supposed to be a girl. Girls don't look like men. I look like a man. I am Sporty Spice."

"Okay, I guess I'll be the first to ask," Simon said. "What the _hell_?"

"SHH!" demanded Alec. "I'm_ think_ing about the _Spice _Girls!"

It was then that Magnus arrived, running fairly slowly, holding his ribs through the pile of clothes. He came to a stop, four pairs of eyes on him, and caught his breath. "I. Hate. Running."

Alec tossed the knife into his other hand and clicked his teeth. Something about Magnus was making him less... spirally. But the warmth pulsing through his veins made him want to shout and stab and run. It made him want to free the world of evil, starting with the Spice Girls in his head. Without considering the cost, Alec brought the knife up to his eye, knowing that it was going to stop their singing once and for -

The knife was snapped out of his hand in a flurry of blue sparks. Those same sparks made a mad, swirling dive for Alec's mouth, freezing him.

"So..." started Simon. "What the hell?"

Magnus tossed half of Alec's clothes at Jace and got to work forcing his jeans back on. It was night time and sort of cold. They both got him dressed while Magnus explained that Alec had bumped into a rather nasty warlock while helping him with some of his High Warlock duties. The lie worked and eventually they wrestled Alec's petrified form all the way back to the Institute where he cold sleep off the madness, firmly strapped to an infirmary bed.

_O-O-O_

They all agreed that it was in everyone's best interest to not tell Maryse and Robert about Alec's Super Naked Jungle Mario experience, which Alec was just fine with. The warmth petered out, but didn't go away and when they untied him on Monday morning, he swore he was going insane. It was like everything he saw was brighter and more in focus. Everything from the crooked set of Jace's habitually broken nose to the little flecks of dust resting in Church's fur became painfully apparent. Everything distracted him - especially his new found reflexes.

Before when Jace said 'Catch', Alec would automatically duck because he didn't consider himself fast enough to stop the tossed blade before it cut his face in half. That was why it surprised him when Jace shouted, "Grab it!" and Alec flung his hands up in the air, stopping the letter opener mere centimeters away from his face. Both boys had been stunned for a moment, and then Alec tossed the opener back, purposely landing it in the wall right beside Jace's ear.

It wasn't until Friday night that Alec truly realized just how different the Elixir was making him.

Shadowhunting had always been something that Alec enjoyed. He was proud of his hard work, of his endless sacrifice for the sake of people he didn't even like. But Alec was only really good at the hunting part of the job. When it came down to making the kills he still felt squeamish. He saw all of the demons he'd slain in the Battle of the Mortal Instruments and the events leading up to it, including the Greater Demon (which he refused to count as Simon's kill because he was the one who had been terribly hurt), as necessities that he had no control over. It was like he had an emergency switch in his body that was flipped every time he came face to face with death. A switch that made him freeze up.

That day things were different.

"Alec, watch out!" shouted Clary.

She was getting a lot better at the job, even if she was a bit slow. Alec spotted the spiky tendril of the Cerce demon as it shot at him and dropped down. The tendril kept going until it found the door of an old Impala and stuck there. The three mouths set in its face all popped open, letting out a chorus of shrieks. Its gelatinous body shook as fours more elastic tendrils grew and stretched for Alec, who rolled out of the way just in time. The spikes dug into the concrete floor of the storage garage and planted there.

"Circle it!" cried Alec.

He and Clary took off in tandem, narrowly avoiding the poisonous spikes that ended up tying the demon in place. There was a sudden thud at the garage door. Alec looked just in time to see Jace's face in a high window. A spiked tendril burst through the wall next to him and he evaporated. Alec worried for only a split second. Isabelle was out there with him. They were okay. Him and Clary, on the other hand, were facing a serious dilemma.

"Kill it!" she shouted.

They ducked a swinging limb at the same time and rolled behind a stack of boxes. "Me kill it? You kill it!"

The top layer of boxes was knocked down on top of the two Shadowhunter's. Clary fumbled and dropped her seraph blade as a second limb came sailing through the boxes. Alec's eyes widened as he saw it barrel towards her. Clary was too busy feeling around in the dark for her dimmed blade. There was no hesitation in his actions. Alec jumped on top of her, flattening Clary so that they were face to face, and took the full impact with his back.

He squeezed his eyes shut, waiting for the usual sting of agony and sharp bite of demon poison. All he received was a dull thud and a headache from Clary's shrill scream. His eyes widened at the lack of pain, which Clary seemed to take for him dying. She covered her mouth with her hand and whispered his name, a question at the end. A frantic little laugh left his throat and he shifted. It must have missed him. When he moved there was an odd tugging feeling at his back.

That was when he realized what Clary was so freaked out about.

A twelve inch bristle was mere centimeter's away from piercing her heart. He followed the spike with his eyes and discovered with a gasp that it was sticking out of his own chest. Warm blood drizzled out of the wound and dripped onto her t-shirt. Alec swore and, of all things, sat up. He felt behind him and discovered the spear had broken off from the demon. With a deep breath Alec pulled it out of himself. It was slick with his blood and got stuck halfway through. Clary shrieked again and her eyes rolled back in her head.

Alec felt like he was going to do the same - only there was still a demon to kill.

He stumbled to his feet, the blood sliding back into his chest. Blue light sizzled around the edges of the wound, healing him, as he took off at clumsy a run, holding the spike like a knife. Wisps of blue vapor slid out of the hole in his shirt as he charged the beast, crying out as wildly as he could. The demon squealed as Alec stabbed straight through its middle, poisoning it with its own toxins. It flailed as he pulled the spike out only to bury deep in again and twist.

The demon was sucked back into whatever dimension it had come from, leaving Alec standing alone in the middle of the room. He swallowed thickly and dropped the spike. It sizzled and disintegrated. Gently, Alec touched the smooth, glowing skin over his heart. He realized distantly that he should have been dead. If he hadn't taken the Elixir, the show would have been over.

The garage door was jerked open a few minutes later and Jace sauntered in, Isabelle close behind. Before they could get a good look at him, Alec tore his blood soaked shirt off and threw it out of sight.

"You have a big thing for being half naked lately," Jace noted with a smirk. "I like it. Gives you an edge. No one tells Alec Lightwood when he can and can't wear a shirt."

Alec snorted and rolled his eyes. "It was covered in poison. Give me your sweater." He caught the black hoodie midair and put it on, leaving it unzipped. "You should check on Clary," he added. "She hit her head."

The joking drained out of Jace and he rushed off to find his girlfriend amid the boxes. Alec stared back down at his chest. His skin was unblemished and pale, swirled with Marks and the raised edges of old scars. Isabelle curled up her whip as she walked over to Alec.

"You killed it?" she asked. "Good job."

Alec smiled and rubbed his hands up and down his arms. "Thanks."

Jace and Clary came back then. Alec turned to look at them. Jace was smiling, bemused as Clary relayed Alec's near-death experience. When she saw him standing there, obviously unwounded, it looked like she'd seen a ghost. "But... but you were stabbed... I saw you pull it out. I _saw _you."

He swallowed, knowing he had to be careful. Alec was a terrible liar. "You must have imagined it," he said. "When I sat up you were unconscious."

Clary's eyes fluttered and she stared down at her toes. "I hit my head." Jace laughed and they all started searching the sight for any traces of demon they had to cover up - Alec grabbed the t-shirt and hid it at the bottom of a trash can out back.

Inside the garage, cradling her bruised head, Clary rubbed at the drying blood spattered across Luke's ratty old Aerosmith t-shirt. When had she cut herself?

_O-O-O_

"And then I just pulled it out," Alec finished.

Magnus looked a little sick. The shards of colour tossed off the gems hanging in the attic window fell across his smooth caramel skin, making it look like he was wearing a mask. Alec wished he had a camera. Aside from the expression, he was pure beauty. "God, Alec. How much did it hurt?"

"It didn't."

"The first half of the Elixir has been administered," breathed The Hollow Lady as she pulled herself out of the wall. Alec jumped. How long had she been standing there? "First you are made untouchable, then you are made immortal."

Alec blanched. "You mean... you mean there's no way I can die now?"

She laughed and he cringed. Bagpipes being stepped on once again. The Hollow Lady folded onto her cushion and began prepping a clear crystal goblet. Early morning light shot through it, outlining the silver runes in the sides. "There is only one way you can die."

"What is it?"

Her eyes narrowed. "You must wish for death with all your heart and all your soul. Only then will it come to you."

Magnus made a face. "So basically you have to go to a Justin Bieber concert."

Alec laughed. "Or watch Twilight."

His boyfriend smacked him lightly. "I like that movie!"

"No. I don't accept that."

A frigid wind ruffled Alec's hair then as The Hollow Lady began her spell. Magnus bowed his head when she spoke in warlock language, his mouth moving along with hers. The cup glowed with blinding white light, so bright that it burned his retinas. Alec couldn't tear his eyes away. The glowing eventually stopped and The Hollow Lady took the cup. She breathed into it, the air turning to silvery smoke as her yellowed wings fluttered. Magnus took it from her and did the same, only his breath wasn't visible. It made the cup spark with blue lightening, though. It was still humming with electricity when Alec took it.

It was Orange Pekoe tea. Not his favourite, but it was hot and there was honey in it. He finished the drink off and wiped at his mouth, waiting for the backlash. Nothing came.

Magnus stood up and Alec followed him, uneasy. "What does this one do?" he asked warily.

The Hollow Lady smirked, her eyes almost wicked in their hilarity. "I don't know what you mean."

Alec left with Magnus, skeptical. And that night, as he watched Magnus snore with absolutely no intention of sleeping himself, he continued to ponder what the fourth serum would do.

* * *

_What do you think the fourth serum will do? I eluded to it. Whoever guesses wins a cyber-hug._


	6. Serum V

**Serum V**

_Secrets are unhealthy._

Alec knew what the backlash of the fourth serum was. It had been hard to figure out at first because it needed time to really sink in. It was especially difficult to diagnose thanks to Alec's long history of insomnia. Monday morning was when he figured there was a problem. He assumed it was stress keeping him awake and tried to self medicate. He sucked back cough syrup and went for a two hour long run through Manhattan. By Tuesday he was getting desperate. The only thing he could think about was sleep. There were huge bags under his eyes and a constant buzzing in his ears. When he moved it felt like his skin was covered in wax.

Tuesday night, Alec went over to Magnus's apartment, deciding to stay over for the rest of the week. Because if anyone knew how to sleep it was Magnus.

Three seasons of Sex and the City later, Alec was lying upside down on the couch, letting all of the blood rush to his head in the hopes that that would knock him out. All it did was add to the dizziness. Alec was so out of it that he didn't even fight when Magnus pulled out the nail polish and started attacking his feet, though every few minutes he would groan like a zombie and try to kick his way free. The smell of the polish wasn't helping with his building headache, but he was too tired to do anything about it.

"Hey, we could always have sex," Magnus suggested cheerily.

Alec grumbled "I feel like a noodle" and the subject was dropped. No one wants to sleep with a noodle.

Magnus continued his work, cattily comparing Sarah Jessica Parker's face to a foot every few minutes. Alec zoned out, staring blankly at the blurred faces roaming around the screen. "You know," Magnus was saying, "I've always looked forward to the day they'll have shuttles to Mars. Won't that be cool?"

It took a moment for that idea to process. For some reason Alec had always assumed the future would be just like the present, only with more touch screens and new pop culture icons. He imagined sitting with Magnus in a space shuttle as they left Earth for a day at a Martian spa, Magnus wearing a shimmering tinfoil space suit, Alec wearing a black sweater and jeans. Alec would complain and try to refuse, but they'd end up going anyways and he'd probably enjoy himself by the end of it. Like always.

"That sounds cool," he admitted. He sat up, tearing his feet away from Magnus's talons. With a frown he wiggled his butter yellow tipped toes. "And that looks so wrong."

Magnus laughed, leaning against Alec. "You get used to it." He pulled the boy closer, putting his face to his throat. "How about you go get in your footsie pajama's and I make you some hot milk?"

"I don't own any footsie pajama's..."

Magnus snapped and Chairman Meow yowled from the bedroom.

"Now you do."

_O-O-O_

It was Wednesday night and Magnus was sprawled over his bed, taking up almost every inch with his twisted limbs. Alec had been disturbed when he realized what an aggressive sleeper the warlock was. Normally Alec fought off his boyfriend's bed hogging tendencies in his sleep, but he was too tired to do any such thing. In his weakened state Alec had been all but thrown from the mattress. He stared up at the ceiling, debating the options. Should he get up and sit on Magnus or go watch TV?

He seriously considered the first option until he remembered that Magnus had an appointment with some Fae in the morning. Alec had to go out with Jace the next evening as well, which he was absolutely dreading. Usually he could get out of Shadowhunting by saying he needed to help Magnus with something. His parents had decided that a Shadowhunter helping a Downworlder was a good method of holding up the Accords, and that was part of the job, wasn't it? Most of the time he actually was helping Magnus, hanging around like the ever present cloud of Clave Law whenever shady characters asked for the High Warlock's help. It was only lately that he'd started using it as an excuse.

And he felt awful for it.

But he couldn't avoid work forever. Not even when he was sleepless.

Alec rustled around in Magnus's cupboard, pushing past the dust covered health food until he found the good stuff - Cheetos and a four pack of chocolate bars. He couldn't help but grin as he took the treasure back to the couch and started flipping through the channels for something worth watching. He ended up stuffing his face to a re-run of Friends, completely ignorant to the tall shadow stalking his way, sniffing the air.

"_Who darest touch my cheesies_?" hissed Magnus, half asleep.

Alec froze and slowly looked up. There were red pillow lines on his face and his bed head could have blotted out the sun, but that did nothing to soften the wild look in his eyes. Magnus shouted "BLAH!" and jumped over the back of the couch. He landed on top of Alec and made a grab for the bag. Alec cried out and dodged his hands, desperately trying to wriggle free. He almost succeeded in shielding the snack food when Magnus leaned over and licked his cheek. He made a high pitched noise of disgust and Magnus snatched the Cheetos.

He pointed to the bag. "These." He pointed to himself. "Magnus's." And then he started to leave.

Alec grabbed his wrists and pulled his back down roughly. Their faces were almost touching and Magnus's eyes softened. His lips parted slightly and he tilted his head forward -

Which was when Alec fell asleep for the first time since Friday.

Magnus sighed and set the cheezies down on the coffee table. He tried to wake Alec up to get him to bed, since lifting him was completely out of the question, and then just gave up. He tucked the afghan around him and snapped a big fluffy pillow from Bed Bath and Beyond behind his head. Once the TV was turned off and the junk food was hidden by cous-cous, Magnus kissed his sleeping boyfriend and went back to his own bed.

_O-O-O_

_They watch me using the eyes drawn on the backs of their hands. They stare as I leave the shores of Idris in my little black boat. I wave to them and they don't wave back. All of them are there. Mom, Dad, Jace, Isabelle, Aline, Luke, Maia, Clary, Jocelyn... I can't count them all. Just before they're out of sight I spot Max. My heart hurts and I call out to him. I try to tell him how much I miss him, but he's too far away to hear me. _

_There are no paddles in the boat. I try using my hands but the water burns. I'm screaming for him, watching my hands heal the moment they leave the acid ocean. I'm unchanging, eternal. What have I done? I can't leave him. I can't live like this. Oh God. Oh Angel. Please no._

_Someone grabs my arms and turns me around, gentle but firm. I blink at him because he's so bright. The pain in my heart fades and all I feel is love. _

_Someday it will happen. Someday we'll go back, he says. But not now. We have a long boat ride ahead of us._

_And I'm okay with that._

_O-O-O_

Alec woke up slowly.

Every time he thought he was awake for good, he would close his eyes and be gone again. It wasn't until someone knocked on the door that he knew he had to get up. He usually didn't answer the door at Magnus's, but the warlock wasn't home. What time was it? He looked at the clock and his mouth popped open. Four o'clock? Alec had never slept past 10 unless he was seriously hurt. Then he remembered that he hadn't slept for days. That had happened before, but usually he woke up at first light.

Alec pushed all of that out of his mind and pulled the door open. It was Clary. She seemed surprised to see him. He looked down and noticed that he was wearing Magnus's pajama pants and an undershirt - nothing else. He tried unsuccessfully to cover himself with his arms and said, "He's not home."

"I was, uh, looking for you."

Alec frowned, unsure of how to proceed. "Why?" he asked.

She bit her lip. "Could I come in?"

Alec thought for a moment. Magnus wouldn't care - Alec sort of did. He finally pushed the door opened more and she slid inside. When it shut again he felt like he'd swallowed a rock. Clary looked around the clustered little foyer before stepping into the main part of the apartment. Slowly, she turned to face him.

It seemed like she was at a loss for words. "First things first," Clary finally said. "Where have you been? Jace came over twice to find you and Magnus sent him away."

Alec furrowed his eyebrows. "I thought we were meeting at six," he said. "It's only four."

She frowned. "Alec, you were supposed to meet him yesterday."

His brain short circuited. "Huh?"

"It's Friday."

Alec squeezed his eyes shut, leaning on the wall. He ran a hand over his face and sighed. "I slept for two days straight," he grumbled to himself. "Wonderful."

"That's not what I came here for," she admitted.

Alec watched as she rustled through her backpack, finally pulling out an old gray t-shirt inside a freezer bag. He made a face, wishing Magnus was there to make a fashion quip. Quipping was another one of his weaknesses. It seemed like everyone could do it but him. "Would you like to use the washer?" he asked, confused.

Clary pulled the shirt out and shook it. Alec's heart skipped a beat.

There was a dark stain in the center of Steven Tyler's cracked face, the telltale mixture of blood and venom. That was one of the reasons Shadowhunters wore black. It didn't show blood as much. How had he not noticed that on Clary before? Alec thought back to that night. He remembered seeing Clary after the ordeal. There was car oil all up her back, but he hadn't seen anything on her chest... because her arms had been crossed. For all he knew he had seen the stain - the majority had been covered up so he hadn't paid it any attention.

"Look at that and tell me what happened, Alec," she demanded.

Alec bit his own lip, lowering his eyelashes. Words seemed to be escaping him. He shook his head and brushed past her, not expecting her to follow - which she did. He tossed the afghan over the back of the couch and sat down, hiding his toenails. Clary took a spot on the recliner and set the shirt next to her, waiting. Alec was trying to think up a good lie. It was basically impossible. He had nothing. Nada. Zip. Zero. It was in times like these that he asked WWMD? Slowly, he reached up and felt the warm metal of the sword resting at his throat. He pushed down a smile and constructed the best lie he'd ever told.

"It actually happened," he admitted. Clary went a little pale and nodded. He reached under the collar of his shirt and pulled out his necklace. "But Magnus gave me this. Whenever I'm hurt it takes some of his magic and heals me on the spot."

Clary took the bait, though she seemed a little unimpressed at his weak storytelling abilities. "How does it work?"

"Magic?"

"Oh."

Alec scratched his face, feeling just as awkward as Clary. "So... uh, tell Jace that I was sleeping."

"Okay." Clary stood up, taking the t-shirt with her. "I'll see you later."

"Wait," he said, sitting up. She stopped, shocked. "You can't tell Jace or Isabelle or anyone about it, okay? It has to be a secret."

She chewed the inside of her cheek. "Secrets are unhealthy, you know."

He scowled. What right did she have to talk to him like that? Alec was the King of Unhealthy Secrets. "I know," he spat.

Hands held up in defense, she said, "Your secret's safe with me."

He got up and led her to the door, feeling a little sour on the inside. He didn't hate Clary - she just annoyed him. But still, she seemed fairly trustworthy. She'd keep his secret, wouldn't she? It didn't matter if she didn't. It was a lie anyways.

_O-O-O_

Alec blinked and then cleared his throat. "Pardon?"

The Hollow Lady's face remained impassive as she repeated, "Remove your shirt."

The air in the attic was stuffy, almost oppressive - or maybe it was just how close the Lady was sitting. She smelled like old paper and moth balls, but he couldn't scoot away. There was a little bowl in her hand, wooden and covered in charred black runes. The thick red paste inside of it made Alec dizzy. He sought Magnus, who nodded in encouragement. Slowly, Alec lifted his sweater over his head, wondering not for the first time what the Elixir had against him wearing clothes.

When her fingers touched his skin he jumped. They were as cold as ice and bony, pressing hard against his chest. She smeared twin red lines down his collarbones, and the began etching complicated patterns over his chest and across his ribs. He tried not to flinch and make faces, especially when the strange paint began to burn his skin. Magnus rubbed his eyes, like he was tired, and rested his head on his knees. When The Hollow Lady was finished, she floated back to her cushion and set the crystal goblet down on the table. It was filled to the brim with fruit punch.

The words she spoke were different this time - older, somehow. They felt more sacred. The more she said, the hotter the paint became until it began to shimmer with red light. It was the same sort of even, calming pain his stele brought. It somehow managed to burn cold, sinking deep into the skin. It sort of tickled. Alec lifted his chin, breathing evenly. The burn faded, leaving the red marks sunken into his skin.

"Drink."

He did and the liquid seemed to wash over the marks as he swallowed. The Elixir was taking him over, intoxicating him. Alec choked a little but forced himself to finish the cup off before dropping the it and folding in on himself. A dull ache pulsed through his body, mimicking his heartbeat. He felt like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, changing from the serum. The magic surrounded him, blazed through him. He had never felt so warm in his life.

It reached a climax and then the sensation slid away, leaving Alec cold, covered in a sheen of sweat in the twilight. Magnus put his hand on his back, tracing the curve of his spine. "Are you okay?"

Alec nodded, gasping. "I'm fine."

The Hollow Lady stood up. "Our Saturday event is beginning. I must go."

Magnus waved her away, ignoring the music that poured in through the door. He knelt there until Alec could straighten up enough to lean against his chest. Soft fingers trailed up and down his back, tracing the Marks and the scars with reverence. "What was it like?" asked Magnus. "Are you hurt?"

Alec shook his head, feeling limp. "It was like being filled up and drained at the same time. I'm okay now."

"That was some pretty heavy magic," he agreed. "Only one more to go."

One more serum - that was all that stood between him and an eternity with Magnus. He smiled. It was all worth it.

* * *

_The comments for this story got all messed up. It's upsetting._


	7. Serum VI

**Serum VI  
**

_Forev__er and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever..._

The week passed, almost completely free of oddness. Well, as free of oddness as Alec could get. As a Shadowhunter dating a warlock it was safe to say that things were still fairly odd. Things took a turn for the uncomfortable when Alec's darling mother took note of all the time he was spending out of the house and invited Magnus to one of her dinner parties - Isabelle was forbidden from so much as looking at the kitchen.

Alec and Magnus showed up together, though it wasn't on purpose. That was plain to see by the swearing and mud coated Jace that took the lift with them.

"You saw it. It was right there. You had a knife. The knife was sharp. And what do you do?" Jace was spitting. "YOU PUSH ME INTO A MUD PIT."

Alec sighed. "It would have killed you."

"NOT IF YOU KILLED IT FIRST!"

The warlock watched the exchange with an evil little grin. "Mud is good for your skin."

"My skin looks good without mud," he huffed as the doors opened. Jace stormed out into the hall, shouting at Church. Alec stared after him with a quizzical expression.

"Usually I'm the one shouting and covered in mud."

Magnus's grin widened. "Mud wrestling?"

"No."

"Not even a little?"

"No."

He sighed and they continued on to his room. Alec needed to shower and change and Magnus loved to scour his possessions for something interesting. There was nothing to find, though the warlock hadn't figured that out. The sounds of him ruffling through papers on his desk and peeking under his bed filled Alec's head while he was in the bathroom. It was only when they stopped that Alec got worried. He hurried up and stepped back into his room, fully dressed with a towel tossed over his dripping hair.

"What's that?" Alec asked, though he had a feeling. It made his stomach ache a little, but not in a terrifying way.

Magnus smiled without looking up. "Do you write letters to people you don't know often?"

"Yes, actually." His cheeks were hot. "And I know you."

"Not when you wrote this." He lifted the worn piece of paper and pointed to the top left hand corner. "You dated it."

Ignoring that, Alec said, "Whenever I have something to say, but I can't say it, I write a letter and hide it. Jace caught on to it and started looking for them, so I started burning them. Except for that one."

Magnus began to read, "_Dear Magnus Bane, Your party was more fun than I thought it would be. For some reason I thought you would be a lot older than you actually were. I don't mean older as in your actual age, but as in how you looked. Not that I thought you would be gray and wrinkled. I guess I didn't think you'd be so sparkly. Or gay. You're gay, right? I am, but I've never really talked to someone else who was. It was a lot less frightening than I would have guessed. And I liked your hair. Your eyes were nice when you smiled, evil though they were a little weird at first. By the way, I know what canoodle means. I just wanted you to know that. It's not an insinuation. Just thought you should know that I know. Oh, and you're very tall. I like it when people are taller than me. Jace always makes me feel like a giant..."_ He stopped, meeting Alec's eyes with a laugh. "You're so cute."

"I know," Isabelle said from the doorway.

Alec turned bright red and snatched the letter out of Magnus's hands. "Um, that was... uh..."

She held up her hands. "Dinner's ready, I heard nothing."

When she was gone, Alec smacked himself in the face. "That was _embarrassing _is what that was."

The warlock stood up and then crouched back down in front of Alec. He wasn't as spiky or flashy, choosing to not look like Boy George in front of Maryse and Robert Lightwood. "When I say you're cute, what I mean is that you're unbelievably sweet."

Alec couldn't help but smile a little. "So are you."

"I know."

_O-O-O_

"So, Magnus, what have you been up to?" asked Alec's dad at dinner. Despite his hulking intimidating appearance, his father had been a lot more accommodating to Magnus. That wasn't to say Maryse was cold to him. She was civil. But she didn't take the same interest in Magnus's life as Robert did. "I heard someone speaking about you in Idris last month. They said something about you taking a leave of absence as the High Warlock?"

Magnus made a face, continuing to carve his pork chop into smaller and smaller pieces. "Oh, they wish. You take a couple vacation days and suddenly all of Downworld is clambering for your job." He shook his head. "They must have been talking about our trip to South Carolina."

When Alec stopped choking on his potatoes, he nodded meekly. "Oh yeah, back in February..." The whole table gave him odd looks. Clary poked Jace and made a face that clearly said, 'Elaborate', and Jace just shrugged. No one else seemed to understand the illusive hidden meaning behind South Carolina, or their trip to there.

"I went to South Carolina once. It was nice," Clary said. She had a vague look of remembrance on her face.

Jocelyn and Luke, who were sitting across the long oak table from Clary and Jace, shared a glance. "When did you go to South Carolina?" her mother asked.

Clary said, "That class trip in the eighth grade. We went to Myrtle Beach."

"Oh! Right!"

Jace rolled his eyes. "I've been there a million times. It gets boring."

"It all depends on who you're going with," said Alec, and then he smothered his smirk with his drink.

"I love the rings, Magnus," Isabelle was saying. "Especially that one." She pointed to a giant rock on his left ring finger. "Where did you get it?"

He shrugged. "Ottoman Empire, I think. 1840-ish." Silence. Magnus blinked. "Oh, wait, I got this one at a Thrift Store in Brooklyn last Tuesday."

The tension broke and Alec shook his head, laughing."Both wrong. I got you that in Paris three months ago."

Hurricane Isabelle was suddenly upon them. "You got him an engagement ring?"

"What? No!"

Isabelle covered her mouth. "It's on his ring finger! On the left hand! You're engaged!"

"Isabelle, stop," Alec ordered, his face red. He glanced over at his mother. Her expression was unreadable. Marriage was one of those Never Mentions. It was alright if Alec dated a warlock. It was acceptable that that warlock was male. It was even okay that he spent most of his free time with said warlock - as long as they didn't marry. As long as no one had to go to a ceremony. The whole thing was stupid, especially since the concern was over Magnus being a Downworlder and not him being a boy. "Please."

Slowly, deliberately, Magnus lifted his hand, plucked the ring off, and slid it onto his middle finger. He arched his eyebrows. "Problem solved?"

"1840, huh?" said Luke. "That's interesting."

"Yeah," Jace said, "tell us about top hat's being fashionable."

Problem solved. The chatter started up again, everyone getting lost in their own conversations. Maryse and Jocelyn, Clary and Luke and Robert, Jace and Isabelle - Alec and Magnus. At first they talked about Paris, how they had to go back some day, that ugly baby they'd seen, and how flights cost so much which was why Portal's were better. Then they talked about the time Magnus used a Portal to escape paying for a meal that he thought tasted bad, leaving his girlfriend alone for an hour. That had pretty much been the end of them. Magnus reached over and took a scoop of potatoes off his plate, and put it on his nose, which Alec clearly didn't appreciate.

After a half an hour or so, their hands gravitated towards each others underneath the table. Alec abhorred public displays of affection, but he found that he needed to hold his hand right then, even if he had potato in his nose. They started talking to Isabelle about Simon and how they could get him into the Institute by tying him to a board, tying the board to an elephant, and having the elephant carry him inside. They came to the conclusion that the ropes would probably snap and it was just easier to not invite him to dinner and have her go to his house. Their entwined hands ended up resting on top of the table, Magnus's thumb tracing over Alec's wrist. He rested against him in response, the two of them fitting together like puzzle pieces.

No one seemed to notice.

When dinner was over, Alec went home with Magnus. In the cab on the way back to his apartment he said, "Thank you."

"For what?" asked Magnus.

Alec kissed his cheekbone, letting it linger. "For being so great."

The warlock actually flushed a little. He threw an arm around Alec's shoulders. "It's a gift."

_O-O-O_

Magnus didn't feel like he was great._  
_

He arrived home at almost midnight on Friday, completely exhausted and dreading the last horrid Serum. All of the lights were off in his apartment, which was silent except for the sounds of the fridge and Alec's soft breathing. He shut the door and locked it behind him, slouching as he made his way into the living room. Alec looked like a rumpled little angel, all tangled up in his blanket. His mouth was turned up at the corners - he was smiling in his sleep. The Shadowhunter had made it a habit to sneak into Magnus's apartment and nap on his couch after difficult hunts. Magnus had asked him once why he didn't just sleep in his bed, to which Alec replied, "But then I wouldn't know when you get home."

With that fuzzy thought, Magnus started clearing off the coffee table, shoving magazines and nail polish supplies wherever there was spare room. He set down the paper bag he'd picked up at The House of Plenty that day. God, did he hate that place. There was something evil about that house, and it wasn't just the skulls or the mistress. Dark magic had a way of seeping into a place, letting a nameless evil dwell among the people who practiced it. Magnus didn't dabble with the dark stuff, though. It gave him the heebie-jeebies.

He started setting up the table the way he always did, drawing the warlock runes with chalk and lighting the candles with blue flame. When it was finished he looked at the clock. They had ten minutes before he had to perform the fifth serum. His intention had been to gently wake up his Nephilim - instead he ended up pinned to the cushions, wondering where he'd gone wrong, staring up at Alec. Maybe that smile hadn't been in his sleep after all.

"And where were you all day?" he asked, running his fingers over the collar of Magnus's shirt.

Magnus smirked. "With my real boyfriend, Alex."

For a moment he looked hurt, and then it dawned on him that Magnus was joking. "Ha-ha, funny."

"My real boyfriend doesn't deplete Cheeto supply," he went on. "Or pounce on me."

"Well, that's no fun," said Alec, lowering himself to kiss Magnus's jawline. Magnus turned his head, eyes half shut at the flickering light of the candles. "I ate the rest of them while you were gone."

"You _bastard_!"

Alec laughed and pushed their mouths together, immediately relinquishing control to Magnus. Lips parting, eyes closing, tongues searching, fingers grasping hair and cloth - Magnus sat up and slid his hand underneath Alec's shirt, resting it over his pounding heart. Alec tugged weakly at his hair and pushed back, putting three years of hardcore training to work. He left Magnus's mouth and went back to his jaw, biting his ear and pulling.

The last thing Magnus wanted to was interrupt, but he knew he had to if he wanted an eternity of moments like that. He gently pushed at Alec's chest until the boy got the point, blinking wildly. He nodded at the table and Alec noticed the transparent ruby goblet. He rested his forehead on Magnus's and tried to catch his breath. Magnus was just as winded, but one glance at the clock told him he had to get a move on. Alec rested back on his calves as Magnus rushed off find the last tragic player in the night's spell - a long, curved knife.

_O-O-O_

"This is it."

"Yep."

"Are you afraid?"

"Nope."

"Forever and ever?"

"And ever and ever and ever."

Alec returned Magnus's grin but couldn't help but notice it didn't meet his eyes. He traced the curve of his face with the tips of his fingers, stopping at his lips before sliding down his throat. Magnus ducked his head and then looked up at him through his eyelashes. Alec had never noticed how many words eyes said until he met Magnus. Happy, sad, angry - love, desire, bliss... _terrified_. That was what his eyes were saying right then. He was afraid.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing."

Alec rolled his own eyes. "It doesn't look like nothing." The words had been uttered innocently, and yet they made Magnus cry. Thick tears built in his eyes and ran down his cheeks before he could stop himself. Alec tilted his head, confused. Were they happy tears? It didn't seem like it. "Hey, it's okay. Just one more, right?" Magnus coughed and sniffled. "Magnus, tell me what's wrong."

The warlock wiped at his face. No makeup smeared because he wasn't wearing any. Alec's stomach knotted. "Tell me the truth, Alec. Do you want to go through with this?"

Alec couldn't believe it. Almost six weeks of pain and humiliation, alienation and fear, and Magnus was the one looking to back down? It was his damn idea! Alec made a noise of disgust. "Of course I want to. How else will I stay with you?"

"But at what cost?"

The room buzzed with the silence that followed. "What do you mean?"

His hands skimmed behind his back and he bowed his head. "What would you do to stay with me?"

For a few moments they sat there, staring at each other, while Alec tried to think up an answer for him other than the generic, "Anything." He considered what he would and wouldn't give up to be with Magnus. Not the lives of his family, or his essential morals. Maybe his favourite sweater. Alec finally came to a conclusion and forcibly took one of Magnus's hands. They met eyes and Alec stated, "Whatever works. I love you, Magnus. With all of my heart."

It was true. The way Magnus made him feel... It was like he could take on the entire world. The love he felt made him strong, gave him courage and confidence. When Magnus was around he felt special and wanted and important. He wasn't just another shadow. He wasn't simply dust. He was Alec Lightwood and he was worth something.

The clock over the TV struck 12 midnight and Magnus whispered, "I love you."

It happened faster than Alec could catch. His love lifted his hidden hand as he rocked up onto his knees, simultaneously gripping Alec's shoulder. The cold gleam of metal seared with black runes was too much for him - he didn't process it. Magnus threw his whole body into the lunge, burying the knife to the hilt, straight through Alec's heart. Magnus held it there, letting the blood drip down into the goblet. It sizzled at the bottom and quickly disappeared.

"The Chalice of the Everlasting has given, and so it shall receive. The blood of Alexander Lightwood pours onto you, O Great Mother." The very words seemed to dig into Magnus's skin. Was he going to be sick? The cup hissed and the room smelt strongly of sandalwood and cinnamon.

Alec's mouth popped open and he took a huge, shuddering breath. Thick, hot blood was rushing up his throat, bubbling in his words. "Magnus..."

Tears were streaming freely down the warlock's face. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," he kept repeating.

He reached out for Magnus's hand as the edges of his vision went black. "I..." He couldn't finish the thought. Alec felt his muscles give out as a hot trickle of blood slid from his mouth. There were no words to describe the pain. No words to describe the emotion. No words at all. With a dull sense of dread he touched the handle of the knife. Magnus slid his fingers over the boy's lips, praying for it to be over soon. Eyes glassy, Alec began to shake - convulsing around the knife which Magnus still grasped.

_Thousands of sunrises and sunsets. Nappies and bibs, tricycles and training. Hurting and learning to hurt. Isabelle, then Max, then Jace. Jace Jace Jace, for so many days. But he was only a brother. Laughing, playing piano. Chopin was his favourite. Izzy with her whip and Max with his glasses, needing to be here and there and everywhere, but he was no where. A shadow on the wall of the Bone City. Demons and fear and clouds and subways. Coney Island, busy streets, full moon, untied shoelaces. Paperclips and black/brown sweaters. Mr. Darcy and Hodge and hiding in his room. His mother's smile, his father's hands, his bow and arrow. Iratze's and ice cream and the Mortal Instruments. Glitter. Glitter glitter glitter. All that glitters isn't gold. Magnus had said that once. Magnus said. Magnus._

Smothering a yelp, Magnus caught his boyfriend's body. He quickly rolled him onto his back and pulled the dagger out. Sick dread building in his throat, he stared down at Alec's face, lost in a see of lifeless blue. The clock struck a final time and the deed was done. Alec Lightwood was dead.

O-O-O

_"Alec? What are you doing here?"_

_It took him a few moments to adjust to the bright white light. Where was he? It smelled like fresh cut grass and magazine paper. Finally his eyes began to focus and he saw a tiny little Shadowhunter. At first he thought it was himself, several years in the past when he couldn't gain muscle to save his life. Then he saw the glasses.  
_

_Max._

_They were standing in the middle of a field with books stacked everywhere. Max was sitting on a pile of them, idly twirling a Seraph blade, staring at his brother. "You're not supposed to be here," he said._

_Alec looked around them. He had to be dreaming... Everything felt so real though. Too real, almost. It felt like his whole life had been a bizarre dream that he was only waking up from then. "Max..." Alec mumbled. His feet jerked into motion and suddenly he was grabbing at his brother, squeezing as tight as he could, only to discover that he was as insubstantial as a ghost._

_"You need to go home," Max said. "That guy with the hair is waiting for you."_

_Shocked at his own incorporeal state, Alec stepped back. He touched the spot over his heart. "He stabbed me."_

_"You wanted to live forever, right?"Alec nodded hollowly. "Then go home. You don't belong here yet."_

_"ALEC!"_

_The scream shook all of the books in Max's Heaven. The boy looked irritated, spinning his knife faster. He stood up and touched Alec on the shoulder. "One day you'll come back. Even the brightest stars die out. But not now. You have to leave."_

_Alec felt a little bit like he was going to cry. "Come with me."_

_With a sad little smile, Max shook his head. "I'm where I belong. You'll figure it out some day."_

_"We love you."_

_"I love you all too." And then he reached out and touched Alec's hand, which still rested over his heart. A gorgeous warmth spread through his entire body. "I give you life, Alexander Lightwood. Forever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever..."_

_O-O-O_

"Alec, honey, wake up. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. It was part of the spell. I didn't want to. Please wake up. Please - "

A tiny ripple went through the room as Alec reopened his eyes to Magnus's face. The spell hung in the air even though there was no pain and no blood - only a very sad warlock and smeared chalk lines. Immortality surged through his veins. It was almost overwhelming. Somewhere far, far away his logic was telling him that he should be afraid of Magnus. He wasn't. Not in the least.

"Alec... Are you all right?"

"You stabbed me."

"I'm so sorry."

"Ow."

Magnus wiped at his eyes with his own shirt. "I'm sorry, Alec. You don't have to forgive me."

Slowly, Alec sat up. He felt sticky and stiff. It was terribly unpleasant. He held a hand up, staring at Magnus with cloudy eyes. "S'okay. Just... don't do it again, all right?"

Magnus wrapped his arms around Alec, squeezing him tight. "Immortality, huh? How does that feel?"

The Shadowhunter wiggled his fingers and bent his knees. "Like I woke up on a bus with a homeless man licking my feet."

Magnus laughed, trying not to be overly emotional. There was no stopping it, though. He loved Alec. He loved Alec being alive. Alec was still too groggy to really comprehend much and his heart still ached where the knife had pierced, but he knew how to answer when Magnus whispered, "Do you still love me?"

"Forever and ever," Alec grinned drowsily.

_And ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever..._

**Fin.**

_

* * *

_

_So that's it! The end of The House of Plenty. Sorry it took so long. I had the homeworkz all week. Damn you March Break! Feel free to comment. _

_Also, I might do a prologue._


	8. Eternity: An Epilogue

**Eternity: An Epilogue  
**

_Sad, pathetic nostalgia._

"Where's my tie?"

"Next to the orange thing."

"The one with the handle?"

"No, the other orange thing. The what's it called. It does that thing."

"Oh, found it! And it's called a lamp."

Magnus rolled his eyes, straightening his tie. He was wearing a white and silver striped suit with huge diamond earrings and faintly sparkling silver eye makeup. As always, he looked absolutely fabulous and extremely tall. It had been his duty to look larger than life ever since he found out Alec loved feeling a little short. Speak of the devil and Alec appears. He was fumbling with his tie, his hands shaking with nerves, looking incredibly similar and incredibly different than the boy who had come to his house party all those years ago. The age marked only in his eyes, the fear of the world replaced with knowledge. It was the same knowledge that occupied Magnus's mind 75% of the time. Years and years of happenings, filed away in photographic detail.

He faux-gasped. "You got rid of the face gerbil!" he cried.

Alec rubbed his clean shaven face, scowling. "Beards are cool now. And warm."

"Honey, it's barely autumn. That thing could have smothered you." He checked Alec up and down, taking in his crisp white suit. The soft red tie matched the lining of the jacket. It fit his contours perfectly, which wasn't an accident. "You look divine."

He smirked. "Oh, I _know_." The expression left in an instant and Alec let go of his tie. "I can't make this work."

"You are helpless." As always, Magnus came to the rescue and stopped his honey bunny from strangling himself with a piece of silk. A thousand years could pass and he would still be doing Alec's ties. He beamed when he was finished and Alec gave him a big hug paired with a sloppy kiss. "Hey! Watch the face!"

With a roll of his eyes, Alec pulled away, stuffing his hands into his pockets. He thunked down onto the bed, grabbing Congressman Meow from the bed, holding his calico fur away from his suit. The cat batted at him until he let go and then rocketed off to hide under the couch or chew someones shoes. Both of them hated the Congressman, but they didn't feel right giving him away. The poor thing was stupid, not evil.

"Are you sure this isn't weird?" asked Alec.

Magnus kept priming himself in the room length mirror. "Absolutely not. We were invited."

"I just feel... uncomfortable," he sighed. "Especially wearing this stupid... monkey suit."

"Don't be silly, Alec," he ordered. All silliness ceased. "They want us there and we're going. I do things like this all the time. It's the price for eternity."

_O-O-O_

Alec continued to grumble about eternity being too damn expensive until they finally left the house an house later to take a Glider cab to the Institute. Not much had changed in New York. The growth of fads and technology were steady to the point that he barely even noticed them. And then one day he looked backwards and noticed just how much things had changed. At that point in time there was a huge Victorian Revival going on, mixing with styles of the early 2000's. He was beginning to notice that things were constantly cycling. It was almost funny.

The Institute hadn't changed one bit since Alec had lived in it. That was the way of the Shadowhunter's and he appreciated it. Change was nothing too dramatic for him, but he also loved tradition - having something constant to go back to other than Magnus. On that day the Institute was decked in white and crowded with Nephilim and Downworlder's. That was something else Alec liked about the current time. There was peace between the two parties. There needed to be for them to deal with the recent increase in demon activity.

A strange feeling took Alec as he and Magnus entered the elevator, going down with three young teen Nephilim who had traveled from Idris. It was still every Shadowhunter's dream to be wed in the capital, but practicality ruled that everyone leaving the place where the activity was the most was ridiculous. The teens looked to be about sixteen, but sounded like they were twenty. Alec pitied them. They didn't have enough time to live their lives. One of the girls tapped the other on the shoulder and none to gently motioned to Alec and Magnus with her head. All three turned to stare, the male in the group particularly intense.

"May we help you?" asked Magnus.

The boy said, "You're Alexander Lightwood."

"Alec, actually," he said. "What's it to you?"

The girl gasped. "So it's true? You're..."

The elevator stopped and the boy pulled the two girls out before they could finish questioning them. Magnus moved to step into the familiar foyer, only to have Alec hold him back. "I want to leave. This is uncomfortable."

The warlock silently stepped back into the elevator, let the doors close, and then snapped his fingers. Blue light shut the power off, leaving them alone. "I know you don't want to, but you have to. This is part of life. You're still an active Shadowhunter, one of the original New York Lightwood's. It's your _responsibility_."

"I know," he half-shouted. "That doesn't make this any easier!"

They were silent, staring at each other. Slowly, Magnus lifted his hand and brushed Alec's bangs back. His hair tangled in the most adorable way when he had it cut right. His old method of bad fashion had later developed into him looking like an ungroomed jungle man. The only reason he didn't resemble a homeless man that day was because of the wedding. Magnus ran his knuckles up his jawline and Alec let his eyes drift shut, long lashes sweeping his cheek.

"I'll be with you."

"Okay."

The elevator doors opened once again and Alec willingly followed Magnus out into his own home. He could almost imagine Max asleep on the couch, despite the white flowers, the gathered people, and the cardboard plaque that stated the days events. There were many familiar faces, but none of them belonged to the people he once knew. Magnus feels like this all the time, he thought. Nostalgia. Sad, pathetic nostalgia. He searched for his husband's hand, only feeling calm when he found it.

The pair wandered with the crowds, all leading to the hall where the ceremony was being held. Alec took in the walls and the carpet and the light fixtures. They were all the same. The part he dreaded came at the end of the hall, where it branched. One way to the kitchen, the other to the giant room they were supposed to hold their Christmas parties in. Alec never went to them. In between these two hallways was a giant photo of the Lightwood family in their Shadowhunter gear. Jace was smirking, Isabelle was stunning, Max was sweet, his father was stately, and his mother was regal. Alec stopped to stare at himself. He had been back to the Institute many times since he lived there. Hell, he'd been their last week to use the library. But not many people were around. About thirteen Shadowhunter's lived there, which meant there wasn't a lot of traffic. Only then, when there were people around to notice, did Alec stare at his own face.

He looked strong and proud, but at the same time terribly, terribly vulnerable. Frowning, he reached out and touched his own face.

"If I could go back," he mumbled.

Magnus smiled sadly. "Hindsight is a bitch for a reason, sugarplum. It lets you know what not to do in the future."

Alec drew his hand back and turned to Magnus. "I wouldn't change anything," he said. "This is how it's supposed to be."

The look on Magnus's face couldn't be described with any word other than approval. "Let's go in, shall we?"

"We shall."

_O-O-O_

The ceremony wasn't the part that Alec was dreading. He liked sitting in the back, completely anonymous, just part of the crowd. When the wedding ended, Alec had the uncontrollable urge to bolt. He didn't want to stay for the reception, though he knew he had to. It felt wrong to be there when the rest of his family couldn't. In the end, he compromised with Magnus. They would go for a walk around the Institute, to a place where no one else was, and then they would come back. By then the makeshift chapel would be converted into a place for eating and dancing.

They headed to the library, staying away from the greenhouses. When they found people chatting among the books, Alec changed course, pointing out different doors to Magnus. The warlock had been inside of the Institute many times, but he'd never really been given the full tour. Alec showed him Jace's old room, as well as Isabelle and Max's. Where his parents slept. His father's office. The room where he and Jace broke a lamp and hid it under the carpet. The music room, where he discovered he couldn't play any instruments. Eventually they walked past his old room. The door was locked.

"Wait a second," he said.

Magnus held up his glowing fingers. "Stele or my magic hands?"

Alec raised a hand to stop him and then reached up to the raised trim around the door. After a minute he pulled an old key down. His husband raised an eyebrow. "I locked myself out one too many times. Runes are hard on doorknobs." And then he slid the key into the lock. It clicked softly and they were in.

Nothing had changed. Literally. Everything Alec hadn't brought to Magnus's had stayed in his old room at the Institute, all boxed up but untouched. A blanket his mother had made him rested on the sleep tossed bed. Alec hadn't slept in his old room in almost a year. It was a fallback when he was too tired to make it home. There were pictures everywhere. Hanging on the walls, cluttering the dresser and the nightstand, leaning against the baseboards - his room was like a storage locker for his memories. Magnus hadn't seen it since the day he moved out officially, two years after he'd become immortal. Isabelle had been sitting on the bed. Jace had been leaning out the window. His mother had stopped by once to give him the blanket, her smile faint but real.

Magnus began looking at all of the pictures, marveling in the fact that they were all framed and dusted. Alec wasn't big on cleaning, which meant it was often done once every two weeks in their apartment against his will. And yet they were all so clean and tidy. Alec with his family, all of them aging around him while he stayed the same. One by one, he'd watched them pass away. But it hadn't hurt as much as he thought it would. He knew they were with Max. Deep down he knew that someday he would be with Max too.

All in good time.

Taking pictures had become a little bit of an obsession as he realized how little time he had left with his family. It had been difficult not to be clingy in his desperate quest to capture every single moment with them. Personally, he thought he did a good job. Magnus seemed to as well. He was looking at a picture of Isabelle, Clary, and Jace all asleep on the subway right before Alec had revealed his big secret. They were so young and so tired.

Alec had told Clary first. It had surprised even him when he admitted it out loud to her, though later it made sense. She already had proof and Alec didn't know how to tell anyone else. One day he just called her up, told her to go to a cafe, and said it. The news hadn't made much of a difference in her. They were friends at that point, but it wasn't the same as telling Jace or Isabelle or his parents. But once she knew, once someone knew, it was that much easier to tell the others. Isabelle had been next. First she'd been shocked, then she'd been angry, then she'd been happy, and then she hit him because he didn't have to get wrinkly. Isabelle, as it turned out, never got wrinkly. She looked like she was in her late fifties until she died at the age of 97, the stubborn old bat. It had been harder to tell Jace. He didn't speak much to Alec for several weeks. Then, finally, he said that he was glad that Alec could have his happy ending. By the time he was twenty-five, that didn't seem like such a lie.

And then he'd told his parents.

His mother seemed... relieved. Like she couldn't believe that she didn't have to watch another one of her children die. Later, when Alec told her about seeing Max, she'd actually thanked Magnus. Alec's father just shook his head and said that he was an adult and made his own decisions. He didn't necessarily approve, but he never said anything negative about it either. And he still treated Magnus like a font of knowledge that was there for the sole purpose of informing him on what this Shadowhunter was like at this time and what that Shadowhunter was like at that time.

The Clave, on the other hand, had shunned him for three whole decades. Alec had narrowly escaped having his Marks stripped, which was an outcome he'd never even considered. It wasn't until Downworlder and Nephilim relations became less rigid and the need for experienced Shadowhunter's grew that Alec was let back in. It wasn't with open arms, but he felt right at home with those who called the Institute home. Most of the hatred came from Idris, which was why he visited was only half of his problem with the wedding, though. The other was an internal conflict. He just felt odd being there.

Magnus set down a photograph of Alec and his father in the library, resting it against a drawing Clary had done of Jace and their two little brats. There was a coloured version of that one on top of the TV at their apartment. "Are you ready?"

Alec rubbed his eyes. He noticed that he'd sat down on his bed without thinking of it. It was still hard and sort of lumpy - the way he liked it. Alec looked around the room, at all the faces. Different moments caught on film. Some happy, like Jace and Isabelle's weddings, and some sad, like his father in the infirmary hours before he died. They would have told him to just get over himself and go. Especially Jace. God, did he miss Jace.

"I'm ready," Alec said. He took Magnus's hand and they left the room of memories behind, locking the door.

_O-O-O_

They sat at a table with two other Downworlder's - a brown haired girl that Magnus knew and another woman with white wings that made him shiver. He didn't know why he hated them so much, though. There was a lot of noise and food and booze. As was custom with all Nephilim events, there was even a fight or two. Alec and Magnus stole off each others plates and and told Tessa the Eidolon about their trip to Peru and how much they hated llama's. Alec thought she was nice, but a little airy. She kept calling him Will, and then correcting herself by calling him Gabriel. Magnus thought it was funny. Alec was just confused.

And then came the moment Alec had been dreading. Speeches. It was the reason he hadn't wanted to come to the wedding. To get up in front of a crowd of his fellow Shadowhunter's was similar to taking off all of his clothes and doing acrobatics. It was the second worse thing next to Magnus making him do the Cha Cha Slide, which would luckily come later when he'd had a lot more to drink. First to speak were the bridesmaids and their like. Then there was the best man, the parents, and an assortment of siblings. Alec stomach tied itself into complicated knots as he silently stood and drifted to the side of the stage.

"And last to speak," the MC said, "is Alec Lightwood."

Everything went really quiet. Alec slowly got up onto the stage, feeling the different eyes on him. For the first time he got a good look at the bride and the groom - Timothy Penhallow and Alexandria Herondale-Lightwood. He stepped up to the microphone, his eyes stuck on the familiar gold hair and green eyes. There was a moment of feedback and he broke away, quickly finding Magnus in the crowd. He was smiling in encouragement. He looked down at his cards and swallowed audibly.

"For anyone who doesn't know me," he started, "my picture's over there." He pointed in the general direction of the giant portrait of his family. "I'm Alec Lightwood and I was invited up here to do a speech because I'm one of the original New York Lightwood's. It makes sense to have me say something because this is a Lightwood wedding in New York." He found Magnus again, who nodded in encouragement. Then, daringly, he looked over the rest of the crowd. All of the familiar and strangely different faces stared back at him. "That's not why I agreed to come up here," he said. "It's not often you get the chance to speak at your great-great grand niece's wedding." There were some nervous titters here and there as people realized he wasn't joking about being the original Alec.

He put his eyes to his cards again, read the first line of the rest of his speech, and then ditched them. "But now that I'm up here, I don't know anything relevant to say. So I'm going to tell you a little bit about your great-great grand father, Jace Lightwood." He thought for a moment. "I could go on and on about all of the funny, stupid, and down right dangerous things he did, but we'd probably be here all night. The one story that sticks out in my mind happened in Queens. He was thirty-five, had two kids. He ran the Institute with his wife and my sister and basically kept the city from collapsing under the weight of all the demons." Alec licked his bottom lip. I was thirty-seven, but looked twenty-one, like I always will. I was shunned by the Clave, Shadowhunting with him illegally. All I had was a frowned upon marriage, a cat, and a bunch of old photographs. Even if that demon could have killed me, my life would have been worthless to the Nephilim." Alec leaned against the podium. "Jace knew all of that. He knew that he could have let me take a hit of poison - but he jumped in front of me anyways.

"A lot of people thought that was selfish. They thought that he was willing to give up his whole family for no reason," Alec said. "But that was just him. He didn't think things through. He just did them, consequences be damned. When he was all fixed up, though, he went right back out. He offered up everything he had to fight demons. Isabelle and I were furious with him. What the hell was he doing? He'd nearly died for no reason. He had a family. A wife. A duty other than running off into the night with a knife like a bloody mad man. So I confronted him. I told Jace that he was being stupid and not looking after his family like he was supposed to. And you know what he said to me?"

He turned so that he was looking at Alexandria. Her face and her body type were new and foreign, but her hair was Jace's and her eyes were Clary's. He knew her, worked with her, loved her like he'd loved all of his other niece's and nephew's, all of whom were staring up at him from the tables. Bits and pieces of Isabelle and Jace and Clary. They were all listening to him, watching him, waiting for the answer. So was Magnus, even though he'd heard the story before.

"He said it didn't matter what happened to him. It didn't matter if he died. He was going to die someday anyways and then it would be my job to watch after his kids and their kids and their kids and their kids. Isabelle's, too. All that Jace had to do was protect his family until he died. The rest was up to me." Alec let the moment of silence be before he continued. "And of course, in true Jace form, he died in his sleep at the ripe old age of 116. Some say he was blessed into having a long life by the Angel Himself. I think he was just stubborn." Alec laughed to himself and others joined him. "That's why I came here today. The Lightwood's are an old, proud family of Shadowhunter's. More than that, we take care of our own. We protect and guard. We watch and guide, whether you keep our namesake or not._ Longae, pugnam superba, pace suscipiet. Lorem plus pulvis et umbra._"

Alec left the stage to silence, followed by building applause. He couldn't help but smile as he sat back down next to Magnus. The bride and groom were beaming.

"I didn't know you could speak like that," Magnus said in his ear.

"Like what?"

Magnus chuckled. "Like a professional."

Alec shrugged. "It's not that hard."

_O-O-O_

Alec was drunk.

He'd come to that conclusion the moment he started doing the Cha Cha Slide without complaint. Now that he was leaving the Institute without the interruption of memory, he knew for certain that he was drunk. Magnus wasn't as intoxicated, though he was carrying his husband rather poorly. His conversation with Tessa had ended led the both of them into visiting her extensive home library some time in the near future, though Alec knew he'd end up refusing when he wasn't feeling so wobbly.

There was a huge line for the old creaking elevator. Alec was certain that the poor thing wasn't going to last the night, but there was no way he was going down the stairs. His feet were sore and he was exhausted.

"I'd never met someone who could sleep standing up," Magnus was saying. "It's an art, really. He should be studied by scientists."

"I'm not good at science," mumbled Alec. "It confuses me."

"I know it does, honey," Magnus laughed. "I know it does." He continued chatting about another time period that predated Alec. Alec was fine with this. He didn't feel up to talking. When he was drunk, Alec got really quiet and stared off into space. Or he slept. Sleeping was what he wanted to do then. "Oh, you again," Magnus half snapped.

Confused by his new tone, Alec opened his eyes. The boy from the elevator was standing there, looking uncomfortable. "Hey, kid," Alec breathed. "What's up?"

The boy frowned, apparently thinking that Alec-From-The-Past would speak Shakespearean. "Uh, is he okay?"

"He's drunk."

"I'm drunk!"

The boy scratched the side of his face. "Oh. I just... I just wanted to apologize for before. I suppose that was rude."

"You were really rude," Alec slurred, nodding. "Who are you?"

"David Penhallow," he said. "It's my brother's wedding."

"Is it, now?" he asked.

"Yes," said David. "Our parents passed away, so I'm moving from Idris to live in the Institute."

"Good for you." Alec patted him on the shoulder and moved ahead in line with Magnus. But that wasn't the end of it. David followed him, getting in his way. Magnus tilted his head at Alec, who sighed and waved him away. Without someone to lean on, Alec felt terribly dizzy. "Okay, what do you want?"

David had the typical Penhallow look to him - his features were even and pleasing, but they didn't match up right to make him overly attractive. He didn't seem as conniving as Aline, which was always a plus. "I didn't mean to insult you. It's just... you're very intimidating."

"Because I'm old?"

"Because you're... I didn't think you'd be so..." David swept around to make sure no one else was listening. After a moment of gathering his nerves he said, "I didn't think you would be so attractive."

Alec stared at him blankly. "You're hitting on me." The young Shadowhunter blushed, eyes on his feet. "I'm married."

David shook his head. "No! I don't mean in that way. It's just... You're like my role model."

Through his drunken haze, Alec took another good look at the Penhallow kid. There was something strangely familiar about him, like looking into the past at himself. Nervous, stuck, scared. It wasn't until he met Magnus that things started to get better for him. Alec frowned, not wanting to offer what he was about to. "Do you have a phone?" David nodded. "Give it to me."

It took him three tries but he eventually got his real number saved into the kids phone. He tossed it back to him. "When do I call?"

And because he was drunk and pitying, Alec said, "Whenever you need to."

Magnus called him over to the lift and Alec went, feeling exhausted.

_O-O-O_

"I'm never wearing a suit again," grumbled Alec as he settled into bed in his plain black pajama pants. "Ever."

"Mhm," Magnus agreed, already half asleep. "But that wasn't too bad, was it?"

"Meh."

"Right, sleepy time."

Alec felt around for Magnus's hand and their fingers caught together. "I love you."

"I love you too."

And that was enough for eternity.

* * *

_That's all, folks! _

_I was thinking of making another story about Alec being a mentor... yay or nay?_

_And I'm sorry for saying prologue instead of epilogue. I'm dumb._


End file.
